


Hannah Fell

by InfernalPume



Category: Original Work
Genre: Autism, Borderline Personality Disorder, Multi, Other, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Superheroes
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-06-09
Updated: 2017-07-29
Packaged: 2018-07-14 00:18:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 26,063
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7144472
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/InfernalPume/pseuds/InfernalPume
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Oomila had been like this all her life; alone on the playground, fiddling with her hands at the back of the school dance, and finally alone in her dormitory all throughout college, her only companion the odd friend of her roommate’s who would stop by to see if she was in. No one ever came for Oomila, never called her ‘Oomi’ or wanted to know what she was thinking. Even after acquiring her powers she had remained a solo hero, more due to her shyness then faith in her abilities. But everything changed when she joined, and she was happy about where her life had ended up. No one was going to take it away from her. No one was going to hurt her friends.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Oomi Sees a Pretty Lady

**Author's Note:**

> This is a little original work made mostly out of self indulgence than anything else. Kinda just started and didnt stop. I'm just gonna keep adding to it where I can, its nice to have a project. Is probably riddled with spelling and grammar errors and theres a lot of tell over show but it makes me feel a bit more okay to work on this so here we are.

 

* * *

 

 

“You’re staring, ‘Bay.”

 

Oomila flinched as she realized she was being watched, and looked up at her tall skinny companion. Underneath her mask she bit her lip before opening and closing her mouth trying to formulate a response. Finally all she could come up with was:

 

“Ah…how d-did-”

 

“You stop wriggling about when you see something you like,” Sweetie said, adjusting his glasses as he lazily looked about the street, “So, who's caught your eye?”

 

For a moment denial flared up in the back of Oomila’s throat, but she swallowed it stubbornly. There was no point hiding from Sweetie.

  

“Um…” Oomila stammered, looking back at the woman she had been watching and undressing with her eyes, “Hah…B-big…parka…pink.”

 

Oomila could often get away with staring. Her costume obscured all of her face, not like Sweetie's whose only concealment of his identity was a pair of plastic heart shaped glasses. Oomila was always amazed at how Sweetie could get away with it without having to cover his face, but he was gazing complacently at her and then back at Oomila without even looking guilty.

 

“Cute.” He said with a short chuckle, leaving the silence in the air once more.

 

Oomila nodded.

 

“Y-yeah…” she mumbled, “I-I like her…boots…and heh…um…” she looked again to the woman, “S-so soft…looking…”

 

“You could probably strike up a conversation,” Sweetie said, “We’re still waiting for the signal from the boss.”

 

This made a shiver run down Oomila’s spine that had nothing to do with the freezing temperature.

 

“W-what?” she stammered, looking up at him. He was smirking, the meaner.

 

"Wah, wah, wah," He teased, then shrugged, “Gives you something to do in this cold.”

 

Oomila chewed her cheek and fiddled with the hem of her hoodie. That didn’t even deserve a response. It was one thing flirting with members of the UCOI, they were her precious friends who understood that a hero's line of work was too hazardous to give a shit about courting. But other people weren’t _like_ that. That woman in the big parka, though she looked soft and nice with her pink cheeks and white mittens, had all these stupid little buttons and switches in her brain that would need to be navigated carefully if she were to ever open up to a stranger. And Oomila despised those buttons and switches with a passion.

 

Sweetie seemed to notice her sudden sour mood and he slung an unprofessional arm around her shoulder.

 

“C’mon I’m only teasing,” he told her, his voice going high with humor, “Thicker skin, Bay!”

 

Fists tightened at Oomila’s sides, but she was happy to be brought in against his chest. Sweetie smelled like gasoline and burnt cotton, with the faintest hint of vanilla perfume. It was a nice smell in comparison to the rust and filth of the city, fumes wafting up from alleyways where garbage rots in the cold. These smells were bad smells, reminded her of Oomila’s old turf. The turf that she had defended when she was on her own, back before being recruited. 

 

 

The embrace was short lived. Heroes in costume aren’t affectionate with each other unless they’re some sort of celebrity couple, and extra attention from the media is the _last_ thing Oomila wants. They return to standing at alert attention, in an intimidating pose in case there are any photographers who want to get a snap before the action starts.

 

Not that there were many photographers, or likely be any action. Oomila and Sweetie were only here to stop any strange cars from crossing the bridge. All of the news stations had parked their vans in the city square where the others were stationed. The others, who were quite a bit tamer then Oomila and Sweetie.

 

Which, while boring, wasn't an issue. Be in enough end-of-the-world battles and the charm wears off. It gets to the point where you’ll take any time off you can get, and fighting in that congested town square with their skillsets would just amount to casualties. Giving chase and destroying someone’s getaway vehicle in these wider less populated streets however, that they could do easy and have their fun doing it.

 

A buzz came from somewhere in Sweetie’s coat, and he checked his phone. One of the things Oomila had been disappointed to learn about this elite league of superheroes is their defining lack of team gadgets. Instead of communicators that flashed and blinked or microphones built into their costumes the administrators had hired a company to make an app, which all members downloaded to the phones they already owned. The app was useful. It was nice having a database of every member registered and a perpetrator list that could be added to by any of them on the go at her fingertips, but Oomila had grown up watching the _Justice League_ cartoon as well as _Teen Titan_ s and later _The Avengers_.

 

“That’s Switcher,” Sweetie said, tapping his response message before putting the phone back into his pocket, “Says we wont have a lot to do. Apparently there’s-“ Sweetie was cut off by the sound of a large _boom_ that shook the snow off of signs and fences.

 

Both Oomila and Sweetie turned their heads in the direction of the city square, and sure enough- there was a cloud of black smoke billowing from one of the taller buildings.

 

Civilians, including Oomila’s pink-parka’d crush, mumbled and looked about. They were too far away to warrant screaming, but close enough to warrant concern and a low hubbub of general distaste.

 

Again Sweetie’s pocket buzzed, as did the pouch in Oomila’s hoodie. Oomila pulled out her phone and read the message on her alerts tab. It was Switcher sending out a group text, telling those on standby to evacuate the building and the buildings surrounding, along with a series of blurry pictures for the snipers to watch the streets. Oomila squinted her eyes at the photographs and wondered as she always did how Tyto or Ashwin could possibly manage to pick out their targets in the ocean of screaming and panicking faces. Soon her phone buzzed as she received directions for her and Sweetie as well as the others stationed at the city exits.

 

“You’re looking for a white van with ‘843 GJT - issued in Iowa (IA) in year 2008’ Check perp list.”

 

Oomila did so, pulling up the drivers description.

 

Hair color       Blonde (BLN)

Eyes color       Blue (BLU)

Height              175-180 cm

Weight            81-90 Kg

 

“Only one getaway driver?” Sweetie asked, lifting his glasses to squint at the text, “There’s gotta be more than one.”

 

Oomila said nothing. She was scanning the streets, eyes narrowing behind her black and copper goggles as she tried to make out license plates in the light snowfall.

 

“S-suh…” Oomila said, before swallowing and trying again, “S-start stopping c-cars…” she said, “A-asking for driver’s license…m-make congestion…”

 

As always Oomila’s words were small and disjointed as they came out of her mouth, but she was comfortable with Sweetie so her sentences made a little bit of sense. Sweetie, for all his eardrums should have been blown out by his line of work by now, could hear and understand her every time.

 

“You got it,” he said, walking briskly up to the small tollbooth by the bridge.

 

The transformation was instantaneous.

 

It was in the way he walked, in how he widened his eyes behind his glasses and grinned ear to ear.

 

“Hey you!” he spat at the poor woman working the booth, “Get over here! We needa secure this station!”

 

The woman behind the counter jumped and scrambled outside, adjusting her uniform as she came out to follow his instructions.

 

“Lower that stripey thingy!” he said, pointing to it, “Don’t let no one through till you see some identification, I don’t care if you block up the whole damn street, do it or I put a bomb under the bridge!” As if to prove he would actually do such a thing his voice went up at that last bit ending with a mad giggle that made the tollbooth operator gulp.

 

She ducked back behind the booth and lowered the striped pole, despite there being no cars on the road. Sweetie looked about and began to finger a trigger he had brought with him, his pink-nailed thumb twitching over the detonator as he looked almost manically at anyone who took the time to stare. No one seemed to mind that the trigger couldn’t possibly be linked up to anything, the white chord quite obviously dangling severed beneath his palm. No, they only saw that red button, and the gleeful cruelty in his smile.

 

Oomila came up silently behind him. Though interacting with civilians made her skin crawl she kept her back straight and stubbornly kept her fingers from twitching. Bad posture and silence meant you were shy or insecure, good posture and silence meant you’re a badass. They made an interesting contrast, the stony and silent little woman standing watch over her mad looking companion.

 

Cars soon rolled across the snowy roads, coming to a stop by the bridge. When they saw the tollbooth operator and the small queue they stuck out their heads to complain, but one look from Sweetie and they shut up. Sweetie helped the poor woman identify the cars one by one, while Oomila kept watch for the plate they were looking for, or cars swerving away from the line to go down a backstreet.

 

Nothing seemed out of the ordinary, just the slow pace that at least jammed up this exit. There were some children in cars, pressing their faces to the windows and talking amongst themselves or to their parents. Sweetie would give the kids his signature smile and a little wave, while Oomila stayed still and stoic. Still, she could hear some of the voices through the thick glass of the window.

 

“Bombay and Sweetie-Pop,”

 

“Are they gonna blow something up?”

 

“Zachary why aren’t they letting us through?”

 

It was understandable that the parents and adults would be nervous. Oomila and Sweetie weren’t like Switcher or Tock, the kind of heroes who used their abilities to save babies from burning buildings or catch falling debris before it crushes civilians. They were the kind that the kids seemed to like better, the kind whose battles were always accompanied by earth shaking explosions on the front lines of the assault on whatever terrorist or supervillain was stirring up trouble that week. When photographers snapped pictures it was always with some tank or helicopter in flames in the background, and during interviews Sweetie always put up the persona of the trigger-happy madman with a few screws loose.

 

If only they knew, if only they knew how hard he-

 

Oomila’s train of thought was interrupted as she saw a white van swerve away from the line. She couldn’t see the plate in the snow, and the window was tinted. She pulled out her phone and checked the exact description she was looking for, before running away from the line to investigate.

 

“You know you can help too ‘Bay, this is-” Sweetie said, stopping as he turned his head and watched her run off.

 

If he was angry with her for leaving him with the civilians while she chased the target he didn’t say so. That or she didn’t hear as she turned the corner. There was the white van; there was the plate she was looking for. It couldn’t move fast in this tight area between buildings, but it would pick up speed once it crossed to the other side’s main road. Oomila sprinted as fast as she could towards it while it was slow enough to catch. Two doubles flashed into existence about five feet away from the van’s bumper, kneeling in the snow with cupped hands. Oomila stepped into her identical selves’ palms and was launched onto the top of the van’s roof, her doubles disappearing with another flash of light and a small ‘puff’.

 

Oomila was small and very light, landing catlike on the roof with barely a sound. If not for the flash of her doubles exploding, the driver might’ve mistaken her for a pile of snow falling on the roof. Despite being in the small space the driver sped up, trying to slide her off the top of the van. Oomila flattened onto her stomach and held onto the ridge of the windshield. There she stayed. It was too cramped for her to fight here, she might damage the buildings on either side.

 

The driver didn’t seem to understand this, as he only sped up faster into the open of the main road. Oomila spawned another double beside her, which also held onto the windshield. Timed seemed to slow whenever Oomila had a double out. She wanted to give it the order to explode, to release the pent up energy it was made of, but she had to wait. One minute, two minutes, three should be enough.

 

The doubled slid down the windshield and rolled between the front wheels upon hitting the snowy asphalt. With a larger flash and a resonating _bang_ the double blew up beneath the van, causing it to flip nose forward into the air. Oomila jumped away from the soon-to-be wreckage and was caught by another two doubles, which she detonated as soon as both feet were on the ground. They had only been up for a few seconds, and fizzed out with a minor flash of light.

 

As she jogged up to where the van lay smoking upside down and kicked open the shattered glass of one of the tinted windows, she ignored the usual nervous ache in the back of her throat. There he was. Blonde hair and blue eyes, and now that she looked at his face she could kind of recognize him from the photo Switcher had sent. There were groans from inside the van, the other passengers had been just as tossed as he was. This was the awkward part. Oomila almost wished that they’d be up on their feet and rearing for a fight so she wouldn’t have to do this part. Squatting silently in the snow Oomila just stared at him, and he stared right back. This was getting uncomfortable.

 

But then Sweetie was behind her, wrenching open the door and dragging the perp out and pinning him to the ground.

 

“Only one vehicle,” he mumbled, “Only one and you blow it up all on your own. What was I supposed to do? I cant hop around like you can ‘Bay.”

 

There had been a time where Oomila would have cowered at her friends reprimanding, back in a time where he might have actually meant it, but now things were different.

 

One by one the four perps were dragged out, and Oomila pulled up the photos. One of them was missing, a woman with pink hair, and Oomila could only assume she had been hit by either Tyto or Ashwin. One kid who couldn’t be older than nineteen spat out a tooth.

 

“We didn’t even DO anything!” he spat, wriggling as Sweetie lashed their arms and legs.

 

Perps often said things like this, especially the young ones. You could always tell they were lying when they were angry and not fearful of the person who had almost killed them, and could kill them still if provoked. The young one continued to struggle, even when faced by Sweetie’s mad look.

 

“We hadn’t even gotten to the BANK yet!” he spat, before being glared at by his older companions, “We didn’t to anything illegal, you ask anyone.”

 

This made Oomila blink. They were bank robbers? She frowned trying to think. Yes, now that she thought of it the building where the attack had been was above a bank, wasn’t it? Upon looking at Sweetie she saw that he was just as puzzled, he put a boot on the kids chest and pinned him down.

 

“What’s this one on about?” he asked the older men, but before they could answer both of their phones buzzed.

 

Both Oomila and Sweetie checked their phones, seeing a message from Ashwin.

 

“This one had nothing to do with the attack,” it read, and again Sweetie and Oomila looked to their small gang.

 

“They say they’re bank robbers,” Oomila texted back, “We flipped their van.”

 

“I knew it!” Sweetie said, slipping from his persona just a bit, “I knew there wasn’t just one getaway car. Big organization like that would need more than one van of perps to pull off a stunt like this.”

 

Oomila stayed quiet as she looked at her phone. If they were what they said they were then they were petty criminals, or at least more petty then the UCOI had any right to arrest.

 

“C-call…police…” Oomila mumbled, tugging on Sweetie’s sleeve. He looked down at her and nodded.

 

“You stay here now,” He said in that sweet and threatening tone, before going about and alerting the authorities that were already pulling up to the situation.

 

It might have worried Oomila that she had attacked a petty criminal’s truck, had she not been operating under her superior’s orders. Heroes of her caliber often got in trouble when they attacked perps who did not classify as terrorists or supervillains. The lines between hero, vigilante, and villain were blurry these days. What with new heroes popping up everywhere, some of them fighting amongst themselves over turf, its almost more like gang violence than justice. But Oomila was safe. She was apart of the UCOI, and while they were strict and the work was constant and brutal, it was nice knowing she had a team of lawyers to back her up whenever there was a mistake like this one.

 

Overhead Oomila could hear the thudding of helicopter blades, and absently she looked up to watch them. At first she didn’t notice anything out of the ordinary, until she saw what direction they were headed. Not towards they mayhem in the middle city where any police or media copters would be headed, but out and away towards downtown. As Sweetie came back to her side she tugged his sleeve again and pointed.

 

“Where’d you think they’re going?” he asked aloud, knowing he wouldn’t get an answer from her.

 

Oomila simply narrowed her eyes underneath the mask, and wiped some melted snow from her goggles. She pulled her phone from her pocket and took a photo, sending it via the group text.

 

There wasn’t much she and Sweetie could do from the ground, this would have to be a job for someone who could fly. They hadn’t brought anyone like that with them. However within seconds Oomila could faintly make out a glowing form as she rose into the sky, the energy wings on her back keeping her aloft as she flew in pursuit. What it must be like to have such powerful energy manipulation to keep one’s self in the air. A kind of power like that eluded Oomila, and would continue to do so no matter how hard she trained or honed her skills.

 

The perps could also see her it seemed, and soon there was the faint rattle of gunshots as they tried to shoot her down.

 

Civilians stepped out of their cars to watch the battle in the sky. Valkyrie, strong and graceful Valkyrie, ducking and dodging with her elegant energy wings. Not attacking, but deflecting the bullets with wide sweeps of her shield. Phones were out and news trucks were pulling up to get a good look.

 

Sweetie and Oomila stepped obediently to the side, allowing the civilians to get a better view. Valkyrie was like neither of them, like none other in UCOI. Breathtakingly beautiful and more powerful than any human had a right to be, she was the very face of UCOI… which was ironic considering they were supposed to be an anonymous organization.

 

As she danced between bullets her energy wings flashed in the sunlight, and Oomila wondered if the snow did the same thing the rain did, evaporating into a mist that only made the lovely hero look all the more dazzling as she fought. Absently Oomila’s eyes flicked to Sweetie’s face. He didn’t bare the same expression as the civilians watching her. His lack of eyebrows were drawn together in a frown, but he kept a smile on his face. It twitched, as fake a smile as someone like him could manage.

 

After a moment he noticed her staring.

 

“Yeah, I’m fine.” He said with a sigh, patting Oomila on the head, “This way we get to go home early. I’m fine.”

 

Shoving the hand off Oomila looked at him, worried. This made him sigh and shake his head.

 

“Drop it Oomi. I’m fine.”

 

Oomila flinched. Even after knowing this man for five years, after watching his transformation, that harsh voice still made her cower back. He turned his back to the battle in the sky and checked his phone, waiting for the message telling them to meet at the rendezvous point.

 

Gaping like a fish Oomila tried to think of something to say, only succeeding in making awkward little grunts and half-words in the back of her throat. It was so hard to talk to people when they were cross with her. Nervously she pulled again at the hem of her hoodie and was about to scamper after him, only to turn when she head cries of horror from the crowd.

 

Oomila turned to the sky and saw Valkyrie, stunning Valkyrie, unstoppable Valkyrie, _her_ Valkyrie, was falling from the open air. The only remnant of her wings was the charred fabric of her costume’s back, and she seemed to be passed out. Something cold slid into Oomila’s belly. She did not cry out as Sweetie did, such was not her nature, but she watched in horror as the speck that was Valkyrie grew larger and larger as she hurtled to earth.

 

Something had to be done. Oomila summoned a double, then two, but detonated them almost instantly. Even if she managed to catch her Valkyrie was falling from too great a height. What they needed was a net, the kind that firefighters carried with them. Were there any firefighters? Oomila looked about and saw none. Growling her frustration she looked again. Valkyrie was no more than a mile away from the ground.

 

No time, there was no time. Oomila stepped into the cupped hands of two doubles and launched herself at her falling friend. At first she hit something hard against her head, seeing stars as she gripped blindly to Valkyrie’s body. She had hit her head on Valkyrie’s metal shoulder pieces, and now the two of them were spinning in the air. At the last moment Oomila was able to tell up from down, and spawned a pair of doubles to catch them.

 

The force of their combined weight made even the sure-footed doubles stumble back and _pop_ harmlessly as the two of them lay in a heap in the snow. Struggling to sit up- Valkyrie’s armor was damn _heavy,_ Oomila cradled the woman’s face and tried to wipe away the soot and snow. No, not soot, that was her _skin_ burned black.

 

Oomila choked back a sob and for an awful moment Valkyrie was dead, before her experience kicked in and she took her pulse.

 

With a sigh of relief Oomila hugged her neck, before looking about. A small crowd had formed around them. With a lurch of disgust and fear as she saw the flash of camera lights, Oomila pulled her dear friend closer and pressing her charred face into her breast. Valkyrie would hate to have been seen like this, all blackened and broken. Usually Oomila was shy of the cameras but now she shielded her precious Valkyrie with both arms, covering as much of her as she could. Gritting her teeth tears began to build unseen at the corners of her eyes. She hated civilians sometimes, truly hated them.

 

Toc made it towards them first. One moment he was just there, as he often was. He set his jaw for the photographers and stooped to be within earshot.

 

“M-m-muh…” Oomila stammered, shaking with fear and anger at this stupid crowd, “Make…g-go away… hurting… c-cant they s-see she’s hurting…?”

 

“I know, I know,” Toc said in his best attempt at a soothing voice, “Give her here…”

 

As Toc took her away Oomila stood on shaky legs. All her bravado of the stoic silent hero was out the window, she shook and squirmed at all this attention directed at both her and Valkyrie.

 

“Fuh…face…c-cover her…face…” she said, pulling her hoodie over her head. She didn’t even care there would be photos of her in her skin-tight morph suit all over the Internet tomorrow, Valkyrie needed it more.

 

All Oomila had to do was hold out the garment, and in a second it was gone, swiped from her hand and now wrapped around her friend. Toc pulled the cat eared hood over Valkyries face and passed through the crowd with Oomila trotting uselessly behind him.

 

The police had finally come, pushing the gathering of people back to give the heroes some room. After approximately five minutes had passed, roughly the time it would have taken Toc to dress Valkyrie in Oomila’s hoodie, the both of them were gone.

 

Though she sighed with relief Oomila was still worried out of her mind. Toc could get her to the med van easy, and the volunteers they had brought with them would leap up and scrabble over themselves to be the one who saved _the_ Valkyrie from the brink of death. Valkyrie was going to be fine. She had to be.

 

Watching as the crowd grew mumbled and dissipated, Oomila turned her head to look for Sweetie. In all the madness she had lost track of him. At first it was awful, her mind rang with worry as her eyes flicked for allyways or other corners he might have disappeared behind in the chaos. She felt a pang of guilt when her mind immediately wondered if he had stuck anything into one of the cars parked along the road. Shaking her head she cursed herself. He wouldn’t. He was doing well. As if he knew she was worried for him her phone buzzed and she looked down.

 

“At the rendezvous point. We’re all here, waiting on Bombay and Switcher.”

 

Oomila shuddered and put her phone away. She didn’t like being alone in any city, but she supposed after pulling a stunt like that right in front of Sweetie it was what she deserved. The panic of the moment was wearing off, and now she was starting to think again. She should have let Toc save her. There was no way he would have let her fall to her death. Even if the very idea of her being knocked from her flight was preposterous Toc would have seen it coming and Toc would have gotten there just in time. Getting there just in time was his thing. Instinctively Oomila went to pull up her hood, then remembered she didn’t have it. She was exposed out here like this, despite every inch of skin being covered she felt naked. Silently she trudged through the streets on her own, trying not to think about the smell or the noise or the unforgiving cold. Maybe she would take a bath when she got home.


	2. Oomi takes a bath

It was the second time a photograph of Oomila had ever been a hot topic on the news. The first was obviously when she had started this pastime-turned-profession, accounts of ‘that madwoman in a morph suit and cat hoodie' leaping about the city and catching criminals. This was different however, this was on a much larger scale.

 

It was also different because the sudden attention wasn’t directed at her at all. When she woke up the next morning in her reclined seat on the jet ride home she was greeted with Tyto handing her his phone. Oomila let out a whimpering groan when she saw it. Valkyrie was front-page news at any appearance she made, but this time the photograph was of Oomila’s outstretched arms underneath her, legs straight, poised, and ready to tuck and roll them both upon impact.

 

“That’s the shot,” Tyto said, taking his phone back to inspect the photo again, “The actual explosion was too high up to get a good look at her. You should be thankful they didn’t get any of you smashing your head.”

 

“This…” she said, her voice quiet and mortified, “…lots of p-places?”

 

“Its practically everywhere,” he said, swiping the image to the side to scan the story, “People are going nuts.”

 

Oomila supposed she couldn’t blame them. Valkyrie was a trump card, their best fighter, she never lost, never got hurt. If Valkyrie could be blown up by terrorists- not even _supervillain_ terrorists but normal people, what was this world coming to? They didn’t know that she was still a person. They had forgotten, Oomila had almost forgotten, that everyone could have an off day. And that’s exactly what Oomila would have to tell her self happened. Valkyrie must have made a mistake, must have done something wrong. She might have had something on her mind, or had just come from another fight. Oomila tried to think back to the last time she had seen her out of costume, where she had said she was headed next. No, last time they were together they hadn’t talked about work. They were busy with other activities.

 

“Hah…” Oomila started, getting Tyto’s attention again, “How…is…?”

 

“She’s not woken up yet,” Tyto said with a sigh, “They removed the burned skin and are gonna see if they can graft it tomorrow…but there’s more burned then there is not. She’ll be in bandages for a while.”

 

Nodding quietly Oomila pulled out her own phone. There were messages from many people, many of her friends, asking what had happened. While ‘Bombay’ had her own little fanbase in the more private corners of the internet, she was hardly ever front page news. They all knew Oomila avoided the cameras when she could, and wasn’t enough of a presence at interviews to warrant a large following.

 

“W-what happened…?” she finally asked, pushing the button to make her seat sit upright.

 

“Well, that’s the bit we don’t rightly know,” Tyto said, leaning against the seat in front, “There was a big _bang_ and suddenly our gal was falling to her death. Switcher doesn’t think the perps had any explosives on them, and Val could have dodged grenades easy, our best bet is that her wings exploded.”

 

 

“…D-doubt that…” Oomila said, tucking her knees under her chin like a child, “…perps...?”

 

“Got away,” Tyto said, “Val was the only one who could have chased them. What do you mean you doubt that?”

 

“Duh….doesnt w-work like that…”

 

Tyto widened his eyes, the black sclera contact lenses managing to make his face more expressive somehow. “What do you mean? Like, there’s a science to it?”

 

After rubbing her eyes Oomila gave him a look, before tugging her morph hood over her face.

 

“Nuh….not m-magic.” She said defensively. This made him stiffen and rub his neck.

 

“I just thought…I thought it went boom like yours do,” he said with a chuckle, “Proves how much I know.”

 

Oomila rolled her eyes before pulling her goggles over her head to hang around her neck. Tyto was new to this, twenty-six years old and only been crime fighting for about a year. He was one of those that had gone to that institution for underage vigilantes, took a year off, then joined up with the UCOI upon graduation.

 

The UCOI, or any other superhero team really, never accepted minors into their ranks and were even hesitant even to allow heroes from nineteen to twenty four to join. Kids that developed super powers early on or were caught serving their own justice in a costume were removed from their turf and sent to an institution, Oomila knew this because she had almost been one of them. She was small for her age, petite, and with her cat-hoodie getup it was no wonder people thought she was just a child. It had been awkward after she had been ‘discovered’ and had to prove she was in fact twenty-four to the UCOI agents that recruited her.

 

Tyto was looking at her like he expected an explanation. She didn’t give it. He should have paid attention in class. Instead she got up from her seat to press her head into his chest. Though he was three years younger he was still a lot larger than she was, like most people.

 

“…Scary…” she said in a small voice, earning her a pat on the head.

 

“Yeah, we’re all freaked out,” He nodded his head to the closed door that lead to the small hallway and then to the little lounge, “Everyone is stone quiet in there, especially Sweetie.”

 

“H-how…Sweetie?” Oomila asked, pulling away to look up at him.

 

Tyto rubbed his neck awkwardly, “Same as last night. No one wants to talk to him. Sometimes he makes little angry grunting noises and we pretend we can’t hear them. Awkward as hell.”

 

It wasn’t like death and mortal injury was new to any of them. There was a reason so many people volunteered to be on the medical staff- superheroes got banged up _bad_ on almost a daily basis. There was a death often enough to be desensitized, it was always all over the news.

 

But the ones that got killed were usually kids. Stupid kids who figured out they could move stuff with their minds and ordered a costume on the Internet only to get stabbed or shot in the street. Valkyrie had been a professional, and while this sort of thing did happen to professionals everyone had assumed she was just…just _above_ it.

 

More than anything Oomila wanted to march into that room and do something to shake everyone out of their dark stupor. To remind them that Valkyrie was _alive_ and was going to be just fine. But that wasn’t the sort of thing Oomila did, no matter how she would have liked to.

 

Seeming to notice her pensiveness Tyto pressed his lips to her forehead, making her look up.

 

“You should probably talk to him,” He said, running a hand against the back of her head before cupping her cheek.

 

Again her eyes dart to the door, and she nods. Pushing away from Tyto she slides the door open and walks down the thin short corridor. She pauses by the bedroom door, knowing that Valkyrie and a few nurses they had brought with them were in there. It would have made Oomila feel better just to see the rising and falling of her friend’s chest, but images of Valkyrie’s charred face linger in her mind. She passes the door and walks into the little lounge.

 

If not for the dead silence, it would be a usual scene on the way back from a job. Switcher sat with a mug of coffee and a newspaper with Ashwin next to him, Toc and Ava sitting across from them. Though Ava is still wearing her costume like the rest of them, her headpiece has been replaced by a brown layer of facemask that she always wore in the mornings. She flips absently through a magazine, while next to her Toc is attending to his tech, the little bits out and strewn on the table next to Ava’s mask. Riptide and Lightstreak are still asleep, Oomila saw them behind her after waking up. Sitting by himself at the bar with his back turned to the rest of the room is Sweetie, on his DS and shaking one leg against the barstool.

 

Some of them look up at Oomila as she enters, most notably Ava and Switcher. Toc’s eyes might have glanced up at her, but she can’t see them behind the goggles. There aren’t even any mumbles of ‘good morning,’ no one wants to be the one to break the silence.

 

Crossing the floor Oomila perched on another of the barstools and opened her mouth to speak. If she did talk, she would be the only one who did it. Everyone would hear her, everyone would listen to their conversation. Instantly it would be like she was on a stage, all of them watching as she tried to reach out to him. Her comfort only worked for him half the time, if she failed and he snapped at her, they would all see it. She wanted to wait until they were back at the base, there was no privacy on these jets beside the bedroom and the bathroom, but she knew the signs that Sweetie was sitting on something that was making the passage of time unbearable.

 

So she just stared at him, making those little awkward grunts she always did when trying her hardest to just interact with someone like a normal person. At first he didn’t look at her, staring intently at his screen. She glanced down at it too, his villager was fishing in the river, but there were nothing but small shadows in the water. She was only adding more pressure on him. She knew that, she hated that, but Tyto told her to talk to him and she wanted to make sure he was alright. It was the least she could do to try.

 

“Sorry for snapping,” Sweetie finally said, making her jump, “And for leaving you in the crowd.”

 

In the corner of her eye she thought she could see Toc turned around in his chair to watch them, but told herself to ignore it.

 

“Ah…” she mumbled, a bit taken aback, “N-no that’s…”

 

“You don’t like being left alone,” Sweetie said, not looking up from his screen, “It was a dick move.”

 

More silence. More watching from the four behind them. There was the sound of the door sliding open as Tyto came in and sat down.

 

“Fuh….fine…” Oomila said, reaching out to touch Sweetie’s shoulder, “Its…hah…its fine…”

 

Sweetie turned his head to look at her, and she tried not to squirm. The way he looked at her was like he was watching her bleed to death, but didn’t want to let her know it. Seeing the obvious concern in his face made Oomila feel a bit more grounded. At least she had some idea what was going through his head.

 

“Wah…” she said, looking back down at his screen, “…What’s in the s-shop today?”

 

Sweetie’s eyes darted back down to his screen and he let go of a breath he had been holding.

 

“Nothing I want,” he said, “But I got a lovely table from doing a favor for Pecan.”

 

Oomila smiled a bit, even though he couldn’t see her face. She didn’t know what she wanted to say to that but she had to keep him talking about something. “W-where did you put it?”

 

The villager pulled his bait from the river and began to trot back to his house.

 

“In the main room, with the rest of the lovely set,” he managed to smirk, “I have somewhere to put my bug trophy, finally.”

 

Oomila watched over his shoulder with interest as he entered the small house, nodding with approval at the display of pink and white heart shaped furniture.

 

For a bit she just watched silently as Sweetie paced the room, making the villager spin in circles when he got fed up with the quiet. With a grunt of discomfort he saved the game and shut the little handheld device, stowing it in his coat pocket. There was nothing he could say right now in front of everyone, but it was obvious that he wanted to talk. Oomila could see the intensity build and build inside him, almost hear the ticking of a time bomb when she looked at him.

 

“Hungry?” he asked, hopping up from his seat.

 

Nodding her head Oomila followed after him, noticing that everyone had gone back to ignoring each other. Sweetie squatted and pulled open the mini fridge, rummaging through it with one hand and finally pulling out a pair of breakfast sandwiches and setting them on a plate. As he shoved the plate into the microwave and set the time Oomila couldn’t help but notice how his fingers twitched. The thumb in particular, over a cupped hand.

 

“So you ever get to talk to that girl in the parka?” Sweetie asked, leaning against the counter and crossing his arms, “The one you were looking at?”

 

Oomila sighed and shook her head, but was also desperate for something to break the silence so she added, “…n-no…but m-maybe n-next time I will…”

 

“Yeah?” Sweetie asked with another smirk that didn’t reach his eyes, “Look at you stepping outside your comfort zone.

 

Ava was up and looking in the fridge, her facemask wiped off.

 

“Don’t go putting any ideas in her head Sweetie,” she said, “Flirting with civilians is nothing but trouble.”

 

“Aw, c’mon. Don’t say that,” Sweetie complained, slinging an arm around Oomila’s shoulder, “Not like ‘Bay’s asking to marry them. Its just practice- she’ll never learn to talk to people proper if she doesn’t practice.”

 

“Bombay doesn’t _need_ to talk to those people,” Ava retorted, though she was smiling and had cocked her hip to the side, “And she most certainly doesn’t need to be learning what’s proper from _you._ ”

 

For a moment it seemed like the light jab had actually hit him lower than Ava had intended. His smile twitched somewhat and her brows knit together with worry, but it was over when he laughed it off.

 

“That wasn’t very nice,” he said, “I’m telling Mari- _Matriarch._ ”

 

Ava rolled her eyes despite her obvious relief, “You’re always letting our names slip,” she chided, “One day you’re going to out someone.”

 

As they bickered lightly Oomila was content that he was all right and took the chance to slip out from under his arm. The microwave _beeped_ and she took out her breakfast, setting it on a separate plate from the one he had used. She walked over to a seat by the window and stared down at the desert passing beneath the jet.

 

When she had lived in Boston she rarely left the state, but when she did it was always surreal watching the beautiful patchwork of trees and countryside as the plane glided into the airport. Flying to LAX was nothing like that. Descending into Los Angeles there was only dry dead-looking desert on any side. When she had first flown here, still dazzled by the sophistication of a private jet, she hadn’t had the time to marvel at how unwelcoming and ugly this place was from the air. But in the last five years she always watched as they flew in every time. She imagined what it would be like running across that wide expanse of dust in the hot sun. How far would she get? How long would it take? How had this vast expanse of hot nothingness become home for her?

 

In about an hour they were landed, another thirty minutes it was time to face the crowds again. The barricade to keep journalists at bay was pushed back further than usual to make room for the ambulance parked nearby. Oomila and her friends stepped off the jet first, and smiling to herself she saw not everyone in the crowd was paparazzi. There was a small group of men and women wearing shirts with the UCOI logo, some of them holding up a banner for Valkyrie, some of them had bouquets of flowers.

 

Switcher always knew what to do. He walked up to the crowd and took one of the bouquets, promising it would find its way to her hospital room. Toc and Lightstreak were right behind him, followed by the rest of them. Even Oomila decided she was brave enough to take a bundle of white roses from a middle-aged woman who was practically in tears.

 

Paramedics climbed the stairs up to the jet and in a few minutes carried out Valkyrie’s heavily bandaged body. At least her face was covered up, as was the rest of her. Still, Oomila could only imagine the complaining from Valkyrie when she woke up and saw the photos of her in this condition. The doors of the ambulance shut with her safely inside, and in turn Oomila stepped into the limousine that would take her home. Sliding into the darkness she finally found the time to relax, and pulled off her hood. Everyone else removed whatever coverings they had for their face, setting masks on tray tables or pushing goggles onto their foreheads. The windows were tinted, and they wouldn’t be leaving the car until they were pulled into the UCOI parking lot.

 

Now they weren’t a team. Now they were her friends. Jon, Jamison, Pari, Julian, Pauline, Edna, and Charlie. Just ahead of them inside the ambulance Valkyrie was Hannah, and she was Oomila, or usually ‘Oomi’ by just about everyone.

 

The drive back was as quiet as the morning had been, but more because everyone was ready to eat a real breakfast and shower once they got home than out of any awkwardness that still hung in the air. No one ever talked about this bit, about how after all the glamor of touching down in the airport, after a job finished and waving to the fans, they all piled into a car still stinking of blood, sweat, and explosives from the fight they had just left.

 

About an hour and a half later, there had been a bit of traffic, they could see the large walls and gate of the UCOI base. Not that it was much of a base, in fact it had been a movie lot before UCOI had bought the land and heightened the defenses.

 

Inside was their little private world. It operated like its own separate community, there were roads and cars for members who had them, and small identical one-story houses lined up in neat little suburbs in the center of the lot. Surrounding were buildings for domestic living, like buying food or doing laundry, along with a small hospital building and office space for the lawyers and team leaders to meet for assignments. The largest building by far was the gym, complete with an outside track, swimming pool, and obstacle course. All of them had to spend some time there on their days off, but usually not after having just come back. One of the only soundstages remaining was now used as a sometimes bar sometimes ballroom, depending on who was home and willing to do something with the place. As the car drove by Oomila could see little benches out front, with members lounging out of costume with mugs of coffee, which meant that Penny was running things at the moment.

 

Finally the car glided to the fountain that stood just outside the square of suburbia, just a normal cement vase structure that spouted clear water into a concrete base. The little group stirred, stretching their legs before climbing out. L.A. was always too hot, always too bright, but the overstimulation was an old friend to Oomila now. She pulled her hood over her head to give some shade and stuck her hands in the pocket. Inside she felt for her keys, wallet, and phone, all still there thankfully. When had gotten her hoodie back from a paramedic the previous night she had been too exhausted to check if anything had fallen out. She waved goodbye to her friends, all but for Edna who walked with her, them being neighbors.

 

Like Hannah, Edna was one of those beautiful heroes who didn’t cover too much of her face when she could help it. Unlike Hannah she was one whose ‘secret identity’ was public knowledge, having already been a famous soccer player before discovering her powers. The alias ‘Riptide’ had been given to her upon joining UCOI, much like Oomila hadn’t been ‘Bombay’ until she was relatively famous within their ranks.

 

Edna yawned and stretched her arms over her head as they walked back in a comfortable silence, the hem of her costume rising enough to show the muscles of her stomach. They were as tight and pristine as the rest of her, shiny in the desert sun. Edna knew that Oomila stared at the exposed skin. Knew this just like Oomila knew that once they passed Edna’s door she would be suddenly grabbed and pulled inside.

 

Being dragged about like this was very specific for Oomila, it was only nice when certain people did it, and when they did they had to do it right. Edna knew just how to yank her so it wouldn’t hurt. Within moments she was tossed into the dark house, and as the door slammed behind Edna Oomila came to press herself up against her.

 

Edna’s lips were rough and chapped, but pleasantly pink in comparison to the very pale rest of her. In the darkness Oomila’s fingers appeared to be black against Edna’s white skin, even though she had already peeled out of the top half of her morph suit. It was as Sweetie often said; Oomlia’s costume wasn’t much darker then she was.

 

One of Edna’s hands was cupped around the back of Oomila’s bald head, the other holding her up against her body. Oomila was so light that no one ever bent in half to kiss her, but held her up to face level like a doll. After this initial embrace, Oomila was set down lightly on her feet, and went about pulling the spandex off her legs. Edna smirked as she watched her little friend hop about, until Oomila was only dressed in her thermals. These were easier to take off, more _fun_ to take off, so Oomila was back in Edna’s arms again, allowing her to do it for herself.

 

“Y-you smell awful…” Oomila mumbled.

 

“So do you.” Edna retorted.

 

“M-maybe we shower first?” she mumbled, pulling away.

 

“Maybe,” Edna said, only moving to kiss her turned cheek.

 

Oomila giggled and held her, happy for a distraction from their disastrous mission. When they were together it didn’t matter that the bad guys got away, or that Hannah was hurt, just that they were both here safe in the darkness of Edna’s little house. Not that it stayed dark for very long, Edna finally released Oomila to flip the switch and bring light to the small apartment. Oomila took this opportunity to dance away, only to have the hem her thermal shirt yanked up and over her head by both of Edna’s powerful hands.

 

Bare chested and sweaty as hell Oomila leapt onto the sofa and arched her back so her hips were in the air. The thermal bottoms pressed tightly against her ass, showing the lines of her hips and legs almost as nicely as when she wore her morph suit. Apparently the view didn’t mean much to Edna, as she was already pulling at the thermals and tossing them to the side. Now all Oomila wore was a pair of boxers she had swiped from Sweetie on the plane ride over, having forgotten to pack her own.

 

“That’s not something I want to see,” Edna muttered as she climbed on top of her, but soon the offensive pair of undergarments was with the other discarded bits of clothing on the floor.

 

Edna made quick work, kissing up Oomila’s belly and between her breasts until she came to the underside of her chin. Oomila sucked in a breath as one of Edna’s hands slipped between her legs as she toyed with her gently. For all that Oomila enjoyed rough behavior, there were some places where you could only be touched gently and Edna knew this well. With both hands Oomila gripped the sides of Edna’s face, pulling her down into another kiss. This one was deeper, better, and Oomila slid a brave tongue across her partner’s lips shyly asking for entry.

 

The request was granted when Edna forced Oomila’s lips apart and jammed her tongue as far as it could go. They stayed like this for glorious minutes, locked together in a warm forceful embrace punctuated by Edna’s fingers delicately dancing around Oomila’s sweet spot.

 

When she slid one finger in Oomila’s eyes rolled and her mouth gaped open, her body going slack and submissive. Edna pulled away, preferring to hear Oomila’s little grunts and gasps over kissing. She had such a tendency to be quiet, after all.

 

“Louder,” she said, kneading her index finger around the curve of Oomila’s pelvis, “I can barely hear you.”

 

Looking up at her face Oomila released a slightly louder sigh of pleasure, trying to focus on looking at her but was distracted. Oomila wanted to go on, she really did, but then she saw something that gave her reason to pause.

 

“Blood…” she gasped, wriggling up so Edna’s finger slid out of her, “Y-you’re bloody.”

 

Edna blinked and brought a hand to her face, sure enough there was a trickle of dried rust colored blood on her eyebrow.

 

“Shit,” she mumbled, sitting up.

 

“T-that’s why we s-shower first…” Oomila said; trying to sit up while her body trembled violently.

 

Edna sighed and nodded, removing the rest of her own costume and folding it neatly, unlike the mess Oomila had made.

 

“W-who were you even f-fighting?” Oomila asked when she was finally upright, sitting cross legged on a sofa that looked far too big for her.

 

“Was helping Will evacuate,” Edna said, wiping her palm against her forehead to mop up any that was left, “Must have gotten scraped by something then.”

 

Quietly Oomila rose from the sofa and went about picking up her clothes. Edna had such a tidy house and Oomila always chided herself for making messes.

 

“Don’t leave,” Edna said, “We can shower together.”

 

Though the idea of this made Oomila smile, she shook her head.

 

“I n-need a long bath,” she said apologetically, “F-forget all that cold.”

 

“I could do it with you,” Edna said, the corner of her mouth pulling into a smirk, but Oomila shook her head.

 

“N-no thanks,” she murmured, “B-but I’ll s-see you late tonight.”

 

“Right,” Edna said, pulling her in for a quick peck on the lips before handing her the discarded hoodie, “I’ll be waiting.”

 

“T-that’s ominous sounding,” Oomila said, though she smiled after pulling the hoodie over her head.

 

Sliding on the boxers Oomila gathered the rest of the clothes into a bundle, which she carried in her arms. She had suffered longer walks of shame in a greater state of undress, and it hadn’t bothered her in the least then so it didn’t bother her in the least now. Soon her key was in her lock, and soon after that the door was shut behind her.

 

Oomila’s house was identical in layout to Edna’s and everyone else’s. Unlike Edna however, Oomila didn’t keep it nearly so neat. There were clothes and empty water bottles cramming up every corner having been kicked there when Oomila was too stressed to clean but fed up of wading through a filthy house. By the DVD player were stacks of DVD cases she hadn’t bothered to put back and had just piled on top of each other. Just about every one had been pulled off the shelf, excluding a few copies of the few movies she owned that _weren’t_ pornographic in nature.

 

The walls and shelves were sloppily decorated, because Oomila never bought things for herself. Just about everything in her house save for the standard furniture was a gift from someone, and because all her odd belongings were gifts she held onto them longer than she maybe should have. The house was crowded with knick-knacks, plush dolls, and sex toys, all of them strange in some way. If someone came across something weird in his or her worldwide travels he or she would always think to bring it home for Oomi. The weirder and more perverted the better, in her book. Oomila’s house was always a reminder to her that she was loved, by a lot of people who thought about her even when she wasn’t with them. The sex was a good reminder too, but it didn’t last like these little gifts did during those awful times when everyone else was out on missions and Oomila was left at the base alone.

 

There was only one room that was relatively clean, and it was more of a large closet than anything it was so small. It was the room that Oomila’s official UCOI uniform stood on its mannequin. Oomila had a ton of morph suits. She bought a new one any time she was out in the city she went through them so fast. But she only had _one_ UCOI uniform.

 

It was sort of similar to her normal getup, or at least was supposed to be. A slick bodysuit with bullet-proof armor pads stealthily sewn in a way that only made Oomila look more slim and muscular when she wore it. It was designed to be light in hot weather and keep her warm in cold weather, resistant to fire, and completely waterproof. The major differences were that it had a cat-eared hood attached to the shoulders with a short mantle, and the mask only covered the top of her face leaving her mouth and the bottom of her nose exposed. It was by far the most elegant and well-crafted outfit Oomila had ever owned, and probably would ever own in her life, and what did Oomila do the first time she had worn it? Spilled coffee all over it and had to pay 50$ to get it cleaned.

 

After that the suit stayed on its mannequin here in the only clean room in her house. She looked at it sometimes in passing, even took it out to wear if she was having a bad day, but it never left her front door and probably never would.

 

Oomila gave it a meaningful glance before crossing to the bathroom and turning on the hot water. Her hoodie was given a kinder treatment then her casual clothes and morph suits, in that she hung it on a peg on her wall instead of tossing it to the floor.

 

Listening to the water hit the tub Oomila sighed and allowed herself to feel the wrenching in her heart at realizing she was alone. It would only be for a little bit, she told herself. She just needed to take a bath and she could see everyone again. Edna was waiting for her in her own house, there were people at the soundstage-turned-coffee shop, and so many of her other friends had already lit up her phone with questions about Hannah and how the mission had gone.

 

Sliding into the steaming water Oomila sighed and sunk down until half her face was submerged with her body and shoulders. Upon further reflection, it had been a good day. Yesterday was the shitty day, and it was over now. Oomila closed her eyes and willed herself to relax. Maybe later she’d do something lighthearted and fun, like play one of Sweetie’s games with him.


	3. Oomi Helps a Friend

As it turns out, it wasn’t much of a coffee shop. While Penny often used this space to make whatever culinary vision she had in her head this week this one seemed to be a bit of a dud. Probably because everyone had their own coffee makers at home, and the ones she and a few volunteers had brought were of the same model and used the same capsules as everyone else. In fact there weren’t _enough_ capsules that everyone liked, and Penny had gotten fed up and made it a ‘bring your own capsules and cup and we’ll make it for you,’ shop instead.

 

Still, besides the gym there wasn’t really a place for everyone to meet casually besides this, so they sat on the ancient prop furniture and held their coffee mugs and quietly hoped Penny would give up and make it a bar again.

 

Oomila didn’t even like coffee. It mixed badly with her medication, and only ever tasted good with so much cream and sugar it was hardly coffee anymore. Oomila found that she had a liking for Chai, especially when mixed with vanilla syrup, but they didn’t have capsules for that. That was something she’d had to get at the overpriced independent coffee shop just a block down from the base, the very establishment that had offended Penny so greatly as to make this her next big venture.

 

Upon entering the soundstage Oomila was happy to see Jamison, Pari, and William all seated on a large c-shaped sofa. There were others as well, others Oomila enjoyed just as much, and had missed while being away. It was her manner to slink in quietly and perch on the edge of a dusty ottoman, so she did and politely waited to be noticed while also being content in not being noticed. Pari saw her first.

 

“There she is,” Pari said with a kind smile, patting the seat beside her. Oomila silently obliged, but leaned against William’s arm after sitting between them. Looking down at her he nodded and brought his coffee mug up to cover mouth.

 

“They were telling us about how you saved Hannah,” Sam said, “Caught her from a five hundred foot drop all on your own.”

 

“O-on…own?” Oomila stammered, frowning, “W-what’s that supposed to mean?”

 

“That you can’t fly,” William grunted.

 

“Or have any sort of supernatural strength,” Pari added kindly, “We would never suggest you couldn’t hold your own like the rest of us.”

 

That comment was more offensive than Sam’s. Pari’s soft cinnamon fingers were stroking Oomila’s scalp. It was something a lot of the women did, Pari especially. Both Pari and Willian had the insufferable habit of treating Oomila as if she were their child, despite Oomila only being a few years behind Pari and having had joined them on their spousal activities whenever they were feeling adventurous.

 

“I-I _know_ I c-can hold muh…my own…” Oomila said, defensiveness breaking up her sentences, “Ah….and Hannah’s a-as well, apparently”

 

“Was almost afraid to take her from you,” William grunted, setting his coffee on a side table, “You looked poised to attack anyone who came near you.”

 

Blinking at this Oomila forgot her irritation.

 

“B-but I _did_ g-give her to you,” Oomila said, “M-might’ve _died…_ ”

 

The fear was returning again. Stubbornly on the way home and while playing with Edna and taking her bath Oomila forced herself not to think about what had happened. But she was out of distractions now, out of excuses. People wanted to know what happened, not just stupid bored civilians but her dear friends who were just as worried about Hannah as Oomila was.

 

“B-but didn’t die.” Oomila added.

 

For a moment after this no one spoke, before Pari added, “There was also an incident with finding the culprit.”

 

“How do you mean?” Quinn asked, perking up at the break in the tension.

 

“John gave us the wrong targets,” Pari said, “The poor girl I managed to catch was no criminal mastermind. She was some sort of thief, not a terrorist.”

 

“Buh…blew up a van…” Oomila added, making heads turn towards her. Another silence as they stared at her, making her swallow, “…J-John gave… p-plate and description…were just bank robbers.”

 

Jamison snorted at this.

 

“I don’t think you’ll be getting in trouble, Oomi,” he said, “People are more spooked about Hannah to raise a fuss.”

 

He pulled out his phone again, having obviously bookmarked the article after showing it to Oomila on the jet, and showed it off to their friends.

 

“How’s that for dramatic?” he asked with a smirk, though dropped the expression upon seeing Oomila’s face.

 

“Very dashing,’ Quinn said politely, Pari and Sam nodding in agreement.

 

Very rarely these days Oomila became uncomfortable in the presence of her dear friends. It happened very little in contrast to how she had felt upon first meeting them, but it was in Oomila’s nature to shy away from large groups of people and no matter how close she was with each of them individually there was only so long Oomila could stay here as a group.

 

“…Check on Sweetie…” Oomila mumbled, uncrossing her legs and hopping away from William’s arm.

 

“Ah…” Pari said, pressing a hand to her cheek, “Yes, yes you go do that Oomi.”

 

There were confused looks from Quinn and Sam, Oomila decided it would be best not to explain. It was pretty obvious that Sweetie of all people probably wasn’t in the best state of mind at the moment.

 

When she had dropped by his house after taking a bath Oomila had politely rung the bell and waited twenty minutes without an answer. They still needed to talk, that much she knew, but where on earth _was_ he?

 

Maybe he had gone to see Maria first thing. Sweetie was reluctant to visit her office so often these days but with what happened to Hannah he could doubtless justify it to himself. That was how his mind worked after all, constantly having to decide between needing the accommodations offered to him or trying to muscle through it like a functional adult. Oomila understood that internal dilemma well, having also been a frequent visitor to Maria when she had first come here.

 

The office space that Maria used was near the wall that faced the outside world. Her room was on the third floor, high enough for a bit of privacy and gave a pleasant view of the busy street below. The property surrounding the UCOI base was prime real estate, no one would be mad enough to commit any crimes nearby and there were always tourists or fans passing by in busses to try and catch a glimpse of the largest superhero organization currently active on earth.

 

It was supposed to be relaxing to watch the normal people carry out their lives in the safety of UCOI’s shadow. Oomila didn’t personally see the appeal, but many of those who were new to crime fighting and had just come back from somewhere cold and deadly found comfort in actually seeing what they were fighting for. Oomila walked up to the front desk and placed her hands on the dark wood, working up the courage to get Paul’s attention. He had his back turned to her and was typing something on his computer. Long minutes she waited there, making her usual quiet little grunts as she tried to speak.

 

Finally she managed, “G-good…morning…”

 

Paul turned to face her, sliding his glasses from where they sat on his brow to rest on his nose.

 

“Oomi,” he said with a smile, “You know its 3 o’ clock.”

 

At this Oomila blushed and looked to the side, making him laugh.

 

“Still three hours back?” he asked, turning back to his computer, “I saw you and Hannah in the news, is she alright?”

 

“Y-yeah…” Oomila said, “I-in the hospital.”

 

“Saw that too,” Paul said, “Didn’t catch a glimpse of her though, just the ambulance. Do you have an appointment?”

 

“N-no,” Oomila said, sliding to her toes and falling back on her heels impatiently as she struggled to find the words, “W-was…actually wondering…”

 

“What’s up?” Paul asked over his shoulder though he still didn’t look at her.

 

“L-looking for Sweetie…” Oomila said, “N-not at home…”

 

Hearing this Paul froze in whatever he was typing. He heaved a sigh.

 

“I suppose things are shaken up for him too, aren’t they?” he asked, turning around again to look at her, “Haven’t seen him yet, but probably will be in this week.”

 

With a nod Oomila turned away from the desk and went back outside. Heaving a sigh she looked about the lot as if she expected him to be in plain view, having just missed him on the walk over or something. Stubbornly she told herself not to keep an ear out for screaming and explosives.

 

Looking to the side exit that most of them used when out of costume Oomila considered the unlikely possibility that he had left the base. While Sweetie wasn’t exactly the same as Edna in that he had been famous before joining the UCOI, he also didn’t have much use for a secret identity. People were able to tell who he was whether or not he wore those heart shaped glasses, and often recognized him when he tried to go into the city.

 

Besides Maria’s office, the ‘coffee shop’ Oomila had just come from, and his own house, Sweetie didn’t really like being anywhere else. His skillset didn’t require him to visit the gym any more than he was forced to, and would often complain about having to keep up the physical aspect of crime fighting. So where was he? Had he just ignored her on purpose when he rang the bell? Thinking of that made Oomila bite her cheek with worry.

 

Sweetie wasn’t the sort who should ever hide himself away. His emotions were as big and explosive as his tools of trade, he couldn’t just shut them out. Someone _had_ to witness them, and Oomila had been providing herself as an audience for some time now.

 

Again she went to his house, ringing the bell and waiting patiently. After about five minutes she pulled out her phone to text him. Five minutes after that she tried to call him. She listened to his voicemail repeat itself, first in English then in Spanish, before the beep made her jump. Oomila hated recording her voice, she ended the call and looked back to the house. If he wasn’t answering his phone it meant that he was in there, hiding from her. That was just childish. The proper thing to do would be to walk away and wait until he was ready to act his age, but Oomila also had trouble acting her age.

 

Pressing her body flat to his door Oomila tried to concentrate. Inside she could faintly hear the sound of one of Sweetie’s yoga DVDs, but other than that there was only silence. The doubles did not need her line of sight to form, and when forming could pass through solid objects. The only tricky part was that it was awkward controlling a double who was looking at something other than what she was looking at. Though she could see through the double’s eyes Oomila was still only used to having so much optical information in the forefront of her mind at once.

 

But soon the lock clicked open and Oomila was able to step inside. The double detonated in a flash, lighting up Sweetie’s living room but leaving no mark on the carpet. Even it had scorched the fibers it would only match the black stains that were already there.

 

Once the flash was over Oomila was blind for a moment, unable to see in the dark. When her vision returned Oomila could see the television was on, switching between clips of women posing on mats and shots of misty mountains or waterfalls.

 

Oomila crossed over to the sofa where there was a lump covered by a blanket and lifted it up, only to see piles of dirty laundry. Oomila scrunched up her nose even though his home’s state of disarray was only slightly worse then her own.

 

“Sweetie?” Oomila said quietly to herself, then swallowed and tried again louder, “S-Sweetie?”

 

There was a groan from his bedroom, which Oomila followed. She found him in bed rolled on his side with one leg tucked to his chest, the other layed out straight behind him. Sweetie slept like a lollipop, his own words, and could only ever doze off when he had one leg pinned to his chest. However, dozing didn’t seem to be what he was doing right now.

 

“Oomi,” He said, sitting up and running a hand through his thin whisps of hair, “Sorry was taking a nap, what’s up?”

 

His smile was too wide, and his left lack of an eyebrow twitched. Oomila sighed and sat on the bed.

 

“H-how are you f-feeling?” she asked, tucking her knees up under her chin.

 

“You mean about all that with Hannah?” he asked, barking out an awkward laugh for good measure, “I guess it sucks that we failed the mission, but she’s fine right?”

 

Again he tried to laugh normally, but it turned into a giggle without him realizing it. When Oomila had first met him she had enjoyed that giggle. It was so high pitched and formless and free, he just looked so happy when he made the sound. Even after Hannah had told her it was a nervous tic Oomila couldn’t really see the harm in it. She had strange little things she did too and other people found them to be just apart of her charm. It wasn’t until she had witnessed one of his episodes for the first time that she realized he didn’t like making that noise. It came out of him choked and forced as he tore his fingernails down his cheeks, his entire body twitching and writhing as if someone was hurting him with some instrument of torture.

 

Giggling didn’t mean anything was funny, it didn’t mean he was happy or felt safe. It was the remnant of something _else,_ something before UCOI, before Oomila and even before Hannah. It was something from the time where he thought it was a good idea to tattoo his entire body in the fashion of a sugar skull, permanently branding him as that crazy fucker with the explosives, and might have had something to do with why he was missing his right ear. Oomila burned with curiosity over what happened, but Hannah had told her not to ask.

 

Hannah had known, she had known and through knowing became closer to him than anyone had been before. And everyone knew how that turned out for the both of them.

 

Sweetie knew the sound was out by the expression on Oomila’s face. In return horror crossed his features for just a moment. There was silence then, both of them just staring at each other. Oomila felt as she always did that she was the last person on earth who should be sitting here with him. He should be with Maria, the _professional,_ or literally any other of their friends could do this so much better then she could. But he didn’t want any of them, probably didn’t even want _her_ to be honest.

 

He sucked in a breath. Swallowed.

 

“I’m fine.” He said, more to himself than Oomila, “I’m fine, I’m fine.”

 

Shaking his head he moved to stand up, but stopped himself midway. “I’m going to be fine.”

 

“Yuh…” Oomila shut her eyes forcing the words to just come out normally for Christ’s sake, “You are a-allowed to be w-worried about her…”

 

For a moment he allowed himself to look how he felt. Angry, mostly, with just a hint of sadness weighing in his eyes.

 

“I don’t know about that Oomi,” He said flatly, “Just about everything I do pisses her off.”

 

“I d-don’t think that’s…true…” Oomila said, untucking her legs to crawl over to him and place a hand on his shoulder, “…She still cares a-about you…asks if y-you’re alright sometimes…”

 

It was the wrong thing to say and Oomila knew it instantly.

 

“That’s either a lie or something I’m too messed up to process right now,” Sweetie said, his voice going high and threatening to make that _noise_ again.

 

Oomila grunted and opened her mouth, only to close it when she thought of something better to say.

 

“Y-you know it w-was never that s-she didn’t love you…just…”

 

“I know what it was Oomi.” Said Sweetie, laying back on pillows that had been pummeled into lumps.

 

More silence.

 

He was staring at her again. Staring at her like she had something that he desperately needed. If he just told her what he wanted she would give it to him, anything to make him better again.

 

“I thought…” he finally said, taking in a deep breath, “I thought it was all over. Everything was okay, you know? Sure… _seeing_ her was hell. But only being in the same room as her. I could look at pictures of her or see her on the news or anything that’s easy its just…” he put his hands over his eyes, “Just watching her fall like that, knowing she was gonna die and the last thing I ever told her was…”

 

“T-that she was a heartless cunt,” Oomila provided.

 

She was fixed with that gaze of his. That probably was not the right thing to say either but Oomila had no idea so she kept going.

 

“A-and in y-your defense…she kind of is…”

 

“Oomi-“

 

“I’m n-not saying that I-I don’t love her,” she interrupted, laying the side of her face down on his abdomen to rest there like a dog, “J-just…well. Y-you know what s-she's like.”

 

Out of nowhere a thought occurred to Oomila. A thought that explained why everyone was so shaken by this when really they should be used to this kind of thing. She sat up and looked into his face, unsure if it was a shot in the dark that would make him angry.

 

“Y-you…you think she _deserved_ it, d-didn’t you?” she said, “A-and you’re g-guilty because of that.”

 

Oomila was not good at reading social cues; the different ways in which the human face twitched and pulled in its secret language of understanding eluded her. Sweetie especially, because of the tattoos. So Oomila didn’t know if the expression Sweetie made meant that she was right or that she had just hit him with the worst pile of bricks he could imagine.

 

“She was just so…” he said, “I can’t be the only one who was curious to know if it was even _possible.”_

“I d-don’t think y-you are…” Oomila said, thinking back to everyone else’s reaction. Was everyone as torn up about this as he was? Hating themselves for being happy that someone had _finally_ knocked Hannah down a peg?

 

It was no secret that to don a stupid gimmick and dance around in warzones you had to have some sort of ego. There were plenty of super powered people who did the sane thing and joined the military or police, the only costume they wore was the uniform given to them by their superiors. Everyone either got into this because they liked seeing themselves look good, or wanted to be like the ones that they saw looking good.

 

Even Oomila wasn’t spared of this mania, it was part of the job. Even Oomila dreamed of a scenario where it was her turn to save the day over the great and powerful Valkyrie. She had always told herself it was just dreams, that she would never step up to the plate, but just like that it had happened and there she was on every news station in the world. It was all very confusing, really.

 

“I…I think o-other people a-are confused l-like you,” Oomila said, “I t-think other p-people don’t know how to feel…a lot of people are c-curious how _you_ feel too…”

 

This surprised Sweetie enough to make him sit up, “What? Who?”

 

Oomila tried to think back to every person individually who showed concern for him.

 

“I-I dunno…everyone knows about…y-you two…” though she kept it vague he still visibly winced at the mention of what had happened, “O-out of everyone…you knew h-her the best…”

 

Sweetie’s expression fell again.

 

“Obviously not well enough,” he said flatly.

 

“B-but still better than a-anyone else.”

 

Again Oomila was puzzled by what exactly she saw in Sweetie’s stare, before he chuckled. Actually chuckled, not a giggle or a laugh.

 

“I guess…I guess that’s true enough,” He said, flopping onto his back, “But I don’t think any of you _want_ to know her. You’re all better off thinking she’s a goddess.”

 

It wasn’t worth it to add that nobody thought that, that there was never a time when anyone except for him saw her that way. Sweetie was alright again, and that’s all that mattered.


	4. Oomi Gives a Gift

Out of all the people who came in to see Hannah over the next week, none of them seemed to want to stick around much. Apparently she had woken up on Monday, and began accepting visitors later that afternoon. Oomila herself hesitated on visiting, more so because everyone else wanted priority. That’s what she told herself at least. Hannah was so popular, every time Oomila tried to visit the hospital she would see at least ten people already lined up. Some of them had gifts, like flowers or chocolate, some Tupperware full of homemade meals because everyone knows the hospital food is rubbish.

 

Oomila didn’t cook, couldn’t really do anything that involved making something. Unlike Sweetie or Toc she wasn’t a _genius_ or anything, she relied on her powers and agility to be useful. Maybe she could get her some flowers, but then _everyone_ had gotten Hannah flowers. There were probably more flowers in her hospital room then she knew what to do with. Oomila wished there was something special she could do, something _only_ she could do.

 

Drifting quietly from shop to shop Oomila picked up things like mugs and snow globes, the kind of thing you bought to remind you of places more then to be of any use. Maybe that was the sort of thing Oomila could give her, something that represented a memory. They had lots of nice memories together, she and Hannah went on dates places all the time, just the two of them. The problem was there were just too many to count, and her dates with Hannah blended together with her dates with other people. What a slap in the face would it be to get Hannah a necklace from Disneyland only to realize she had actually gone there with Penny.

 

Alright, something memorable between the two of them then. There had to be something of that sort too. There was one memory that had come to mind, actually.

 

Oomila left the shop and took a bus down to the sunset strip. Most of the stores here were costume of gift shops, but sure enough the small comic book store she had visited so long ago was still there.

 

There was a small jingle of bells as she opened the door, and the two or three employees that were sorting paperbacks on shelves looked up before returning to what they were doing. Oomila finger’s twitched even at this small amount of attention as she walked to the back of the store where she found a rack of posters. There were a few of the old ones, Iron Man, The Joker, and maybe one or two joke posters for _The Simpsons_ , but these days there were way more of members of the UCOI. _Real_ superheroes. Oomila looked through them, a very specific image in mind. Her face twitched uncomfortably when she saw a blown up version of that picture that was already over the news, noticing that her breasts had been edited to look larger even underneath her hoodie. She really hated civilians sometimes.

 

Finally she came to one that she found acceptable. It was an old poster, but a good one. She looked at the number on the bottom corner, then stooped to find which shelf it would be under. Pulling out the paper tube wrapped in plastic she walked up to the cashier silently, setting the poster on the counter top.

 

“Fan of Valkyrie?” The woman asked with a smirk, “Even after that _fail_ in Chicago?”

 

Oomila stiffened at this. Out of all civilians, comic book fans had to be the worst. They saw real superheroes the same as the ones in print, as characters and not real people risking their lives every day. They drew pictures of them naked or having sex with famous supervillians and ranted on forums about which ones were the ‘coolest’ or their favorite. It was all a big fucking game to them, and Oomila hated them for it.

 

Oomila should snap at this woman, remind her very harshly that Hannah didn’t give a _damn_ about what she thought and neither did anyone with half a lick of sense. But Oomila didn’t say that, just looked away and blushed madly and tried to hold back tears of rage. She couldn’t even will herself to say _anything,_ just push a twenty dollar bill over the counter and accept her change.

 

On the way back Oomila stared down at her purchase, still keeping it in the protective plastic. 

 

When Oomila had first joined the OCOI she had been completely unknown outside of Boston. Even then, Striker was the big hero in that city, and she only guarded her small section of it. As much as Oomila insisted she didn’t care about recognition, of course she did because she definitely wasn’t doing this out of her love for fellow man. She had spoken to a few of the publicists about her image and what kind of person she wanted to be portrayed as, even managed to sit through an interview or two so long as she wasn’t being recorded.

 

Even after her debut she still wasn’t exactly big news. There had been an article in a few magazines, but new heroes were introduced all the time. There were too many to make a large fuss over, and Oomila herself might’ve been popular with her skillset if not for her lack of a presence on film and radio. She always let other people talk, and never made any move to take the spotlight, even though she had desperately craved the attention in those first months.

 

So it had been a bit of a surprise to her when she had seen a poster of herself in that comic book store. All at once she realized she didn’t want attention, the moment she knew the poster went on sale she became obsessed with knowing what kind of people would buy it. It was exhausting. She would return to the store every day she could to count the ones on the shelf and see if any had been sold. She didn’t know what was worse, the idea that someone was making money off a picture of her in spandex, or the fact that _none_ of her posters were ever sold. There were six Bombay posters rolled up in their shelf every time she went back there, completely untouched. She knew they were untouched because they were collecting dust, and hadn’t been disturbed by anyone.

 

Naturally Oomila didn’t tell anyone about her mania with posters. It was too silly to imagine, it made her feel like a teenager waiting for notes to appear on her text posts on Tumblr. Sweetie had noticed that she was going into town more often than she usually did, and since he couldn’t follow her he had Hannah do it for him. It had been humiliating being caught in that comic book shop looking at a poster of herself, she had been almost too mortified to speak.

 

Hannah hadn’t said a word, didn’t even smirk of shake her head like she did so often when she caught anyone else in an embarrassing situation. She didn’t act high and mighty, or try to give Oomila some bullshit advice about what it meant to be ‘a real hero’. No, Hannah had walked right up to that rack and pulled out one of the Bombay posters herself, slamming it on the counter as if daring the cashier to say anything. On the bus ride back neither of them said anything. Oomila didn’t know her well enough to thank her- and was a bit intimidated because of the massive crush she had on her. But later that year when Oomila had finally worked up the courage to visit Hannah in her home, there was the Bombay poster hung on the wall, right above her bed.

 

Nothing had ever made Oomila feel so validated, so important. After that she avoided cameras and publicity altogether. She already had one fan who was more important than the opinions of some civilian.

 

The memory made Oomila smile as she stepped off the bus a block away from the base, and made her way back to the side entrance. As she walked she rehearsed what she was going to say in her mind, how to word it to make it express her love to its fullest extent.

 

There was the question of _when_ exactly she was going to visit as well. Oomila kept watch over the clinic for hours until the sun began to set, seeing people go in an out. There were more visitors than usual, more than could possibly see Hannah and have a decent conversation with her. It occurred to Oomila that they were going in and coming out rather quickly as well. She saw Jamison walk in and back out in under ten minutes. Was she asleep perhaps? Maybe Oomila should wait until tomorrow to give her gift.

 

Oomila was about to turn to leave when Jamison spotted her.

 

“Oomi!” he called out, waving and running to her side, “Everyone’s been looking for you- Hannah’s throwing a fit.”

 

It was all Oomila could do to stare wide eyed at him.

 

“I don’t know what you said to her, but she’s furious. She’s demanding to see you.”

 

That made Oomila manage to spit out a word or two.

 

“Wuh…why?”

 

Jamison shrugged but pointed a thumb to the clinic, “I don’t know but I would get in there if I were you.”

 

Oomila nodded her head, looking wide-eyed to the clinic before rushing in. There was a small queue of people inside, gathered around the waiting room with their flowers and cards, but as soon as Oomila entered they all looked up. Oomila froze, clutching the poster to her chest before swallowing and trying to imagine her happy place. With shaking legs she followed a nurse to Hannah’s room, and was that sobbing she could hear behind the door?

 

Upon seeing Hannah for the first time since Chicago, Oomila’s initial reaction was relief. Had she just imagined seeing her face damaged? It looked just as pale as ever, none of the black or redness at all- then she saw the stitches.

 

Maybe she had mistaken them for makeup first thing, even though Hannah never wore eyeliner. As Oomila came closer she could very well see that Hannah’s eyelids had been sewn on, as were her lips and the right side of her cheek.

 

Hannah looked furious, or about as furious as one could be without eyebrows. Her chest heaved underneath her hospital gown, and angry tears were rolling down her patchwork cheeks.

 

“Well, you’re here now,” Hanna said, glaring at Oomila, “Took you long enough.”

 

Oomila’s mouth gaped open and again she tried to speak but was cut off.

 

“I suppose you think I’m going to thank you,” she spat, her voice still quiet but growing with every word, “And maybe I should. I was _going_ to thank you, just as soon as I woke up I was going to thank you. First thing I said to myself once they stitched me back together was that I was going to thank you- _the first thing._ ”

 

The words stung like hot metal, making Oomila flinch and again struggle to speak.

 

“But then- then you _never_ came!” She was shouting now, “Its been how many days? Everyone in this damn compound as been through here with their stupid flowers and disgusting food and I sat through it because I _knew_ you were coming but then you _never did._ ”

 

Oomila took a step forward but was stopped as if hit by a powerful gust of wind.

 

“I knew why you weren’t coming. It’s the exact reason everyone _else_ did come! They want to see me like this, they think is _funny,”_ she narrowed her eyes, “But you don’t think its funny. You think its disgusting- _ugly_ don’t you? That’s why you didn’t come- you didn’t come because you knew I wouldn’t ever be the same! Not in the way _you_ care about anyway.”

 

All of this was so mind bogglingly ridiculous Oomila couldn’t even summon the words to begin _._ And how could she? Hannah was shouting again.

 

“Well I wont let you get away with it! What’s the point of you saving my life if you can’t even _look_ at me after? No. If you were just going to hide away and forget about me then- then you should have just let me _fall.”_

 

With that dramatic emphasis she let the words hang in the air, still glowering at Oomila with all the ferocity she could muster. For a moment the only sound was the ticking of the clock as Oomila tried to juggle formulating a response with holding back her own tears.

 

“A-are you done?” She finally managed. It was the sort of thing John or William would say to Hannah when she was throwing a fit, and it seemed to work some of the time.

 

Maybe not this time, however. Hannah crossed her arms and fell back on her pillows still with that look of outrage and betrayal.

 

More ticking of the clock.

 

Oomila crossed the floor and went to sit on the stool next to the bed, then thought better of it and rose to perch near Hannah’s knees. Hannah stopped looking at her, in fact began to very stubbornly look away. Oomila chewed her lip to tatters, and it was obvious she had waited too long because Hannah was inhaling to start again.

 

Quickly, say anything, _anything._

“I b-brought you a gift…” Oomila said, holding up the poster for Hannah to see.

 

This surprised her at least, and she took the bag and ripped through the plastic to open it. For a moment she was silent as she looked at her own image, then was glaring at Oomila again.

 

“What a lovely reminder of what I’ll never be again.” She said flatly.

 

“T-that’s not-” Oomila stammered, the story of Hannah being her first fan and the speech about her love dying in her throat, “I-I just…”

 

Hannah sighed and spooled it up, tossing it to the side where there was a table laden with flowers. More silence.

 

“Why didn’t you come?” Hannah finally asked, almost reasonable now.

 

“S-so many p-people here a-already…” Oomila said, the tension worsening her stutter, “Duh… didn’t think y-you had the t-time…”

 

Hannah snapped her head to look at Oomila.

 

“You think I want to talk to any of _them?”_ she asked, choking out a hurt laugh, “Everyone just wants to see me broken.”

 

“T-that’s not…” Oomila lied, “T-they’re our f-friends…”

 

“They’re _your_ friends,” Hannah corrected, “And Julian’s friends. I know everyone still blames me for what happened to him.”

 

At first Oomila didn’t know what she was talking about, so few people knew Sweetie’s birth name. There wasn’t much Oomila could say to that. It wasn’t the sort of thing that was anyone’s _fault_ per se, one could just as easily said it was Sweetie’s fault for popping the question on live television.

 

“I’m sorry,” Oomila finally said, “I-I should have c-come sooner.”

 

“Yes, you should have,” Hannah huffed, wiping away her tears with the palm of her hand, “But you’re here now…so that’s something I suppose.”

 

Looking down at her fists resting on her knees Oomila tried very hard not to look at Hannah’s face. It didn’t seem like the polite thing to do. Once Oomila got over the stitches, she could see that the skin was lumpy and didn’t look like it belonged there. How horrible it must be for Hannah, having been so lovely to look at and suddenly having that all be gone. All Oomila could do was hope it would heal, and Hannah would have her precious beauty back.

 

“You wont even look at me,” Hannah said, breaking the silence. It wasn’t even accusatory, more hurt than anything.

 

Oomila snapped her head up guiltily and stared pointedly at her face, trying to find something that had been untouched by the explosion so it didn’t look like she was staring at her scars. She settled on her left eyebrow, still arched and elegant as it had been before.

 

“…What h-happened?” Oomila finally asked, fingers fumbling with each other in her lap.

 

Hannah rose from her place nestled in the pillows and took a deep breath, releasing it with a bit of a rude noise out of what was left of her lips.

 

“It…it was stupid…” She finally said, “I tried to summon my lance…”

 

Oomila blinked, “W-what’s so wrong with that?” she asked.

 

Hannah looked to the side, “For a second, I could have _sworn_ the guy manning the gun was…was just a _kid._ ”

 

This caused Oomila to stare at Hannah in disbelief, though she stayed silent knowing that Hannah would go on.

 

“I summoned it before I got a good look at who was inside, but when I got a line of sight I saw someone there who couldn’t be any older than sixteen. I hesitated…”

 

Oomila hissed in sympathy at this. First rule of energy manipulation is that you _never_ hesitate. Like Oomila’s doubles energy weapons became more volatile the longer they were forced to take physical form, it was safer to chuck the weapon away at the first sign of trouble then to hold into it. Hannah’s powers were far stronger than Oomila’s, and as a result she had less time to wait before her projectiles became deadly at first range.

 

“ _You_ wouldn’t have hesitated,” Hannah said, looking to the side, “You would have dropped the damn thing the minute you realized you couldn’t throw it.”

 

This took Oomila a bit off guard. “H-hannah…”

 

“Don’t.” She snapped, “I did something stupid and unprofessional. My head wasn’t on right…and now I’m paying for it.”

 

“Y-you’re still h-human Hannah.” Oomila said, for the first time leaning forward to touch her knee, “A-and we’ve all g-gotten hurt, now it’s j-just your turn.”

 

“I forgot I was human, that any of us are,” Hannah admitted with a grim chuckle, “Sure we dress in jeans and a tank top on our days off and go to bars and stuff but I just…”

 

She sighed and looked again to Oomila.

 

“…Do you ever wonder what it would be like if…if you never hit your catalyst?”

 

Oomila flinched, as anyone did when saying the ‘c’ word. It was something that everyone knew about, but avoided at the same time. Those without superpowers knew to never ask about catalysts, those with chose not to share. It was something deeply personal, a painful memory so close to your heart that it revolted you just to mention it.

 

“A-all the time…” Oomila said, though in reality she hated thinking of that awful moment.

 

“You know what I was before all this?” Hannah said, looking out the window.

 

“An actress, r-right?” Oomila said, rubbing her neck.

 

At this Hannah laughed again.

 

“Is that what I told you? No. I _wanted_ to be an actress, and everyone said I couldn’t because I was to…what was it? Sensitive. Yeah,” Oomila realized that Hannah’s hand had tightened into a fist, “My family were all crap Oomi. They thought that just because they were family they could always take the piss out of me. Always harassing me and winding me up, then laughing at how angry I got. I had to get out right? I had to leave them- had to _prove_ I was more than their pissed off kid right? I was gonna leave, and when I came back I _had_ to be better then them. _Above_ them.”

 

“W-was t-that when it h-happened?” Oomila asked, feeling wrong talking about this even though Hannah initiated the conversation, and seemed willing to share.

 

“Nah…” Hannah said, “It started when I had a way out. There was this audition see? They were looking for new talent for this play, some indie project I forget the name. I practiced and practiced, even when my family made fun of me I practiced. I was gonna get out, I _had_ to get out.” She smirked, relaxing her fist and sighing. “You can guess what happened next.”

 

Oomila nodded her head, tucking her knees under her chin in the childish fetal position she always assumed at times like this.

 

“Y-yeah,” she mumbled.

 

“I always thought that it didn’t matter that some producer turned me down,” Hannah continued, “I already got the biggest break of my life. I’m bigger than I would have been from that play, anyhow. But now, now I wonder what it’d be like after that play. I probably would have struggled on my own, worked at a bar or something. I’d probably spend my whole life waiting for something to happen, and it never would,” She chuckled darkly, “And I would still have my face.”

 

“W-well you d-do still h-have your f-face actually,” Oomia said, smirking herself now, “I-its just m-made out o-of your ass.”

 

For a moment Oomila was worried the scowl she received was genuine, before Hannah snorted and pushed her off the bed.

 

“God it looks awful doesn’t it?” Hannah asked, her voice normal again, “I only got to look at it after the surgery.”

 

When Oomila shook her head Hannah snorted again.

 

“Liar,” she chided in the kind of haughty way that meant she was having a good time.

 

The silence they sat in was comfortable now. Hannah laying back on her pillows, and Oomila had a chance to look around. Piled on just about every surface there was were flowers and gift baskets of all sorts. Cards and fanmail were stacked up on the floor, with brown unwrapped packages of various sizes cluttered by the door. Oomila looked down at where her pitiful poster had been shoved, and sighed. It had sounded so good in her head, and now Oomila had come to visit her friend empty handed.

 

Looking back and inhaling to apologize, Oomila caught Hannah staring out the window. Upon further inspection, Oomila could see that it wasn’t the base outside that she was staring at, but her own reflection. Suddenly Oomila had an idea for a better gift.

 

Placing a shy hand on her knee, Oomila slid of the bed and walked to Hannah’s side. She was careful to only touch her good cheek, afraid of hurting her or opening her stitches. Gently she pulled Hannah’s chin towards hers, and delicately pecked her lips.

 

There she lingered for a minute or two before pulling away, still stroking her cheek. Hannah stared at her, her own hand coming up to touch Oomila’s. She choked out another laugh, opened her mouth to say something, then wiped away the tear forming in one of her eyes.

 

“I h-have to wake up early t-tomorrow,” Oomila said apologetically, “W-we’re being s-sent to T-toronto…”

 

“Right,” Hannah said, “Right, you should probably get ready…”

 

She smiled to her, and Oomila smiled right back, before squeezing her hand and going on her way. It was dark out now, Oomila checked her phone to see that it was almost six.

 

It wasn’t time to go to bed yet, waking up tomorrow would be hell no matter what she did. Oomila made her way to Sweetie’s house again, more to check on him than anything. She heaved a sigh of relief to see the lights were on inside, and she could hear the sounds of him and Jamison arguing over whatever game they were playing through the door. Jamison was better at games then Sweetie was, having played them more as a kid. Oomila smiled to herself and rung the bell, ready to just relax for a bit with her friends before heading out again to save the day.


	5. Oomi Feels a Little Awkward (As does everyone else)

Waking up before an alarm can be a blessing and a curse. A blessing because in those first few minutes Oomila thought she could sleep in, a curse when she looked at her phone and found out that she wouldn’t be able to for long.

 

With a groan she rolled over on the messy bed and nuzzled Sweetie’s arm. He was still out cold, and since _he_ didn’t have to be up early today he saw no problem in convincing Oomila to stay up hours after she should have to binge watch all _The Matrix_ movies.

 

“What? Jamison’s never seen them?” he said, “That’s a crime against all film!” he said, “C’mon Oomi you can leave after the first one,” he said.

 

Except of _course_ she couldn’t, even after Jamison said he didn’t see the appeal and left, of _course_ Oomila stayed with Sweetie to watch the rest because Sweetie could always get her to do whatever the hell he wanted.

 

Feeling her move, Sweetie stirred just enough to see where she was, and maneuver so as to have an arm slung around her. Oomila obliged, turning so her back was cupped against his chest. It wasn’t all his persuasion, not really. Some of it was just her, the way she found just about everything he said after midnight hilarious, how addicted she still was to just the feeling of being _wanted_ somewhere, even though she had been surrounded by friends for years. She didn’t even _like_ the these movies, but what she did like was pointing out ridiculous theories that weren’t all that clever, making crude references that weren’t all that funny, and cracking inside jokes as they lay together trying to sleep. But now it was 4:30 in the morning, and she needed to be on the jet by 6. It would take twenty minutes to get there, five to dress probably, and ten to shower if she used Sweetie’s and not her own. So that meant she had an hour to snooze, sixty glorious minutes to turn her brain off and-

 

Oomila frowned as she heard the alarm. The once serine chirping of birds had become a beck and call from the underworld in the years she had used it as her notification alert. Had it been an hour already? She grumbled and rolled away from Sweetie’s embrace to check her phone, squinting at the bright light. It was only 4:45, it hadn’t been her alarm that made the noise, but a text message from Maria of all people.

 

Rubbing her eyes she opened it, then blinked with confusion.

 

“Is Sweetie with you?” It read.

 

Oomila looked back to where her friend slept, then to her phone.

 

“Yes, why?” she asked, frowning.

 

Sweetie was doing fine, and had been doing fine in the past week or so. After his talk with Oomi he had been acting just as he always did. Granted, Oomila hadn’t seen much of him.

 

There was word of a rogue vigilante causing a ruckus in the Canadian wilderness, and Oomila had been selected to go take him into custody. She would be apart of team 56.C, made up of all energy and matter manipulation skillsets. These sorts of teams were usually unbalanced and made for a specific scenario, so they hadn’t actually been out in the field before. To make up for it Oomila and the others had been running drills like crazy, testing how their abilities synergized in this new and unusual group dynamic.

 

So maybe Oomila hadn’t been there to watch over Sweetie, but he was a grown man. Surely he hadn’t don’t anything that warranted Maria demanding he come to her office so early in the morning. At the buzz of her phone, Oomila frowned again.

 

“There’s been a change of plan, bring him with you.”

 

Again Oomila stared at Sweetie, then shook her head and tried to get him up. As she might have suspected, her gentle prodding was met with little response. When she began to shake him more violently he cracked open an angry eye.

 

“What?” he grumbled, sending a shiver down Oomila’s spine.

 

“A-ah…” she said, withdrawing her hand before trying again, “Y-you have to get u-up.”

 

Sweetie didn’t respond, Oomila could only assume he had fallen asleep again.

 

“Sweetie.” She said a bit louder, shoving him again.

 

“Why?” he asked, rolling onto his side, “Goodbye, have a nice trip. I’ll think of you every night, just let me sleep…”

 

“No,” Oomila said, “A-apparently you h-have to come too.”

 

Sweetie rolled his head over to look at her, squinting through the darkness of the room.

 

“Says who?”

 

“M-maria.”

 

Finally Sweetie sat up, rubbing his eyes and looking at her.

 

“Did she say why?” he asked, “Like, do I just need to confirm an appointment or something?”

 

“I-I’m sure that’s it,” Oomila said, peeling off her tank top and shorts as she crossed to the bathroom, “D-don’t fall back asleep,” she warned, turning on his shower.

 

Sweetie’s shower was kind of disgusting. Filled with empty bottles and a greasy brown ring in the tub, it wasn’t exactly a luxurious experience. How was it that Sweetie was always at the last drops of shampoo and conditioner? He always argued that no one else used his shower besides her, and she didn’t exactly need it now did she. That wasn’t exactly true, she just didn’t need as much as most people.

 

With a sigh Oomila just made do with soap, of which he always had an abundance in a variety of sickeningly sweet scents. Stepping back into his bedroom stinking of cherries and vanilla she pulled on her thermals. The thick leggings and turtleneck were a bit awkward to wear in California’s lack of a winter chill, but she would be thankful for them in the Canadian cold. Sweetie had obviously tried to get up, and was staring blankly as his hands. Unsure if he was actually awake Oomila crossed to his side and touched his shoulder.

 

“You should text Maria and ask what its about,” He said, flopping back on his pillows, “There should be _laws_ in place preventing this kind of mistreatment.”

 

Stepping into her morph suit, Oomila scowled at him. “I-if you w-went to bed at a reasonable time y-you’d be fine.” She grumbled, trying to pull him up again, “A-and I’m f-fine.”

 

With another groan Sweetie swung to his feet and lurked into the bathroom, Oomila could hear him knocking down a precarious stack of bottles and turning the water on.

 

Bringing the cat-eared hood up over her head, Oomila checked her appearance in a stained full body mirror. She didn’t know why she did this, it wasn’t like her simple costume looked any different from day to day. Not like Ava, whose mask was half made up of makeup and other adhesives. She was one of the more glamorous amongst their ranks, many of the other women wondered how she was able to keep up such a perfect appearance, even Valkyrie would get dirty sometimes.

 

Walking to the kitchen Oomila turned on the kettle. She noticed that the small room was less cluttered than usual, in a rare state of grubby enough to be homely but clean enough so as not to be disgusting. Upon further inspection Oomila saw the sink was also empty of dirty dishes, and when the water was boiled and Oomila crossed into the living room with her cup of tea she saw that all the dirty clothes and blankets that usually dirtied the room were gone.

 

The sofa was still stained, and Oomila had to avoid a crusty spot as she sat, but there was enough room on the coffee table for her to put her feet up.

 

How had she not noticed how much cleaner Sweetie’s house was the night before? She could have sworn there were a number of discarded take out boxes littering the floor when she had last been in here, as well as various cans and bottles balanced precariously on the arm of every chair.

 

When Sweetie came out of the shower Oomila scooted over to give him room to flop face first onto the dirty sofa.

 

“How long do we have?” he grumbled, “And did Maria say what she needed me for?”

 

Oomila pulled her phone out of her pocket to check the time, and saw that she had no new messages.

 

“N-no,” Oomila said, “We have about thirty m-minutes.”

 

“Thirty minutes until we have to be there, or thirty minutes until we have to get up and go?” Sweetie asked, voice muffled by the pillows.

 

“Till w-we have to g-get up and go.” Oomila clarified, before feeling her phone buzz once again. “M-maria says to s-suit up,” she told him, causing him to groan again. Louder and angrier this time.

 

“What, am I going on this mission with you?” he asked, “I’m a technician, isn’t the whole point of C teams that none of you use gear?”

 

Oomila shrugged.

 

“M-maybe there’s a-another emergency,” she offered, “You’re apart o-of the instant r-response team, right?”

 

Sweeite shook his head, “I got taken off Code Red when Patrick got promoted,” he said, “There were way too many of us, and I don’t like being in charge. Or being woken up in the middle of the night.”

 

Oomila nodded and rose to her feet, checking her phone again.

 

“W-we better g-go now then, to f-find out what’s up,” she said, much to his dismay.

 

“I guess you’re right,” he mumbled, standing and heading back to his bedroom, “Gimme a minute.”

 

Oomila nodded and brought her cup to her lips, then almost coughed it out when he stepped back out again before she had even finished her drink.

It always astonished Oomila how quickly Sweetie could slip into his getup. He had openly complained about how he thought easy to don costumes made of spandex were tacky and lacked any sense of glamor. No, Sweetie chose to face supervillains and alien invaders done up in a three-piece suit, sometimes with a top hat and detonator cane if he felt the situation was particularly dire.

 

Choosing to leave the hat behind Sweetie kept the cane, probably so he’d have something to lean on as he was asleep on his feet.

 

“Lets go,” He said, straightening a wrapped candy-shaped tie he had bought at a novelty shop.

 

Oomila trotted behind him as he swung open the door, and lurked into the darkness outside.

 

There was once a time where Oomila believed it was preposterous to be out so early, back when she thought it was preposterous to be up before 9. A few less then glamorous missions later she had gotten the hang of things, and now somewhat enjoyed the blackness of the early morning.

 

Obviously Sweetie did not share the sentiment. Behind his pink glasses his eyelids twitched and the grip on his cane tightened and untightened.

 

“Y-you can sleep on the p-plane.” Oomila assured him, that was her own plan anyway.

 

“Hate sleeping on planes,” Sweetie objected, “Cant find a way to lie comfortable.”

 

On the elevator ride in the large office building Sweetie slumped against the handrail, and had to be elbowed in the ribs upon reaching their floor.

 

Reaching the conference room Oomila was surprised to see the carefully prepared lineup of her team wasn’t there. She of course recognized all of them, even if they weren’t her friends she had an idea of who was in the facility based on daily trips to the gym alone, but out of the three of them she had only ever worked with Lightstreak before. Sweetie was obviously the only technician here, but most noticeable was that Oomila and Sweetie were the only ones that specialized entirely in offense.

 

Not everyone’s powers were of the kicking ass variety, that was a given. Catalysts often didn’t care about the usefulness of the abilities they gave you, it was usually in relation to the type of trauma it generated from, not how well it could be used to punch someone in the face. Defensive and utility powers were still invaluable, no team was properly balanced without one or two. If Oomila remembered correctly, Phaser was some kind of mind control wizard and Ægis generated forcefields. Lightstreak would be able to double as offensive if he really needed to, but Oomila was a heavy hitter. Her attacks were used sparingly and carefully, but if she was the only offensive fighter it would mean she’d have to be watching everyone’s backs at once with attacks that were volatile even with perfect concentration.

 

It seemed the state of things had not gone beyond Lightstreak’s notice as well. When he saw Oomila he frowned, and looked to the side.

 

“Please tell me you guys arent here about Toronto,” he said, looking tired, “Or that Switcher or someone is coming.”

 

“Well, I don’t know _why_ I’m here,” Sweetie offered, rubbing his neck, “Maybe we’re just all here early and our real teammates didn’t get the memo.”

 

Though he was wearing sclera contact lenses Oomila could have sworn Phaser just rolled his eyes. Under her own mask she chewed her cheek, feeling awkward and like she was sixteen. All she had to do was keep her back straight and avoid fiddling with her hands, and everyone in the room would know she was an adult who could handle conflict in a mature manner.

 

There was a silence for a time, before Sweetie spoke up again. “Did you all get the message from Maria too?”

 

Ægis nodded, uncrossing his arms and pulling out his phone.

 

“Said there was a change of plan, and I was being temporarily transferred to a C team,” He shrugged, “Never been apart of a C team, but I thought the whole point was that none of us had any gear.”

 

With this comment he nodded towards Sweetie, who made a motion to tip his hat, realized he wasn’t wearing his hat, then awkwardly fiddled with a lock of hair.

 

“I was transferred in too,” Phaser added, his voice older and harder than Oomila might have guessed from watching him lift weights.

 

“So Oomi’s the only one who was originally on this team,” Sweetie said, turning his head to look at her, “Sorry- _Bombay._ ”

 

Again there was the subtle motion of Phaser rolling his eyes, was Oomila the only one who was catching it or did everyone else not notice how incredibly awkward this was?

 

Then all eyes were on her, making Oomila’s knees shake a little before she stubbornly made them still.

 

“Y-y-yuh…” she mumbled, “I…hrm…ah…”

 

“Wonderful,” Ægis said, “We’ve got an unstable team and the only one who knows what’s going on’s forgotten how to talk.”

 

“That’s not a very nice thing to say at all,” Sweetie said casually, pulling a mint from his pocket and unwrapping it, “’Bay’s gonna give us a rundown, just give her a minute.”

 

Again there was silence, it was Oomila’s turn to speak. Just form the words, say where they were going, the name of the perp, _anything._ When she came up with nothing after five more minutes it was Phaser who broke the silence.

 

“Who is the team leader any way?” he asked, “Because the only one of us with commanding experience is…” he nodded his head to Sweetie, “…and even then you’d need extensive research on the situation to properly-“

 

“Good morning, everyone.”

 

The crisp British lilt cut through the tension like a knife through butter, the effect of its abilities so intense that even Oomila stopped shaking long enough to take a breath without gasping.

 

Maria was walking into the conference room, a coffee in one hand and a thick coat in the other. Most astonishing however, was that she was in costume. When everyone stared at her she smiled warmly right back.

 

“I realize this might not be what we all expected, but there’s been some new information about the target that requires a special procedure that would have been impossible with the original lineup. You five were all available, and the closest we have to a functional team that can best handle this situation. Phillip, Sam, I believe you two usually work together, Charlie Oomila and-” she paused, eyes going wide, then chuckled and brought her wrist to her forehead, “I’m sorry, I’m not using the proper names, am I? I will have to sort that out once we’re there…”

 

Matriarch checked her own phone, before tucking it into the pocket of her jacket.

 

“We’re running low on time, I will only give a quick seminar,” she said, clapping her hands together, “Understand that this decision was made on some last minute information on the situation, but I do really think that I’ll come out of this glad that I put my faith in you all.”

 

These last words hit everyone the hardest, especially Sweetie, whom Matriarch fixed with that impossibly loving, comforting gaze.

 

Behind her mask, Oomila blinked. That was an unusual thing for Matriarch to say. She knew the effect she had on people, had thirty long years to master carefully crafting her sentences to make it so people didn’t feel as though they didn’t have to work for her affection. Sentences were always about _you,_ your feelings, your aspirations, your goals. Never about what she might want from you, because when you thought Matriarch wanted something from you, you did everything in your power to give it to her whether it was her intention or not. It only got worse the longer you knew her, learned that she could make anything better in a few words. Any ill-considered comment from her had the power to manipulate and twist you into doing anything she wanted, and she knew this.

 

Oomila didn’t like to think why she might find it necessary to use such wording now, didn’t like to think why she might be staring down Sweetie in particular.

 

Behind Matriarch was a projection board, which flickered to life as she picked up the remote from the table and pressed a button. Oomila quietly perched in one of the large swivel chairs, folding her hands neatly in her lap.

 

“Now, I don’t have time to give a full explanation,” She said as an image of a strange mechanical contraption appeared behind her, “If you have any further questions you can ask Bombay, who I am appointing as my second in command due to her knowledge of the situation.”

 

Oomila nodded at this. Though she had been dreading it, this was the most logical outcome and she had been in this sort of position before. Stubbornly she told herself not to look at Ægis or Phaser, if they had issue with it she’d just have to prove there was no need for concern.

 

“The focus in question is on a rogue vigilante that has gone by the name of Jæger, a technomancer with the ability to control and haphazardly splice technology within a radius. For the past week or so he has been delivering his own justice in the city of Toronto, but his powers are so immense he often does more damage then good, and last night his casualty count has elevated him to the status of a public safety hazard.”

 

The images behind her changed to that of wreckage of streets and roads, what looked like cars ripped in half with their mechanical guts stolen, and photographs of the labeled remains of anyone who was inside the vehicles he had tried to incorporate into his attacks.

 

“Due to his abilities 56.C was scheduled to track him down, but in light of recent information that came in just two hours ago there has been a change of plan. Footage of the actual attacks are mostly corrupted, his psychic link interfering with all recording devices, but a photography student was able to capture a picture of his face, and he has been identified as Alexander Coy.”

 

Again the image changed, but to what looked like a school photo next to information that revealed he was only a thirteen year old boy. Granted he _did_ look old for his age, there was something dark and aching about the eyes of an otherwise youthful face.

 

“But that’s, that’s only a _kid,”_ Lightstreak said, “We aren’t qualified to arrest minors, why arent any of the institutions going after him?”

 

“We will be working together with St. Oswin’s Institution to see that Mr. Coy is safely incarcerated in their facility,” Matriarch answered, “They do not have the means to transport him without our assistance, Ægis can generate a field in which psychic powers cannot penetrate, I will be there to care for him while he is under our protection.”

 

That made sense, now Oomila thought about it. This poor kid probably thought with his incredibly powerful and useful skills he’d be as big as Switcher, and now had to turn on the television every day to see all the lives he had taken. And _Christ,_ only thirteen years old too. If anyone needed the soft gentle persuasion of Matriarch, it was him. This was as much a rescue mission as an arrest.

 

“The section of the city where he was last sighted has been evacuated, his parents told of the situation. While he is alone he is still surrounded with technology he can use to his advantage, and may have allies who are helping him. His powers usually manifest as a larch bipedal mech that grows as he telekinetically attaches more parts. Authorities have been able to knock some of his heavier weapons off, but he can remake them at any time out of any material, and we can only assume that he is reconstructing his arsenal as we speak. Bombay, you have proven yourself adept at taking down larger opponents, and Lightstreak will be in charge of administering a harmless medication that will render him unconscious once made vulnerable.”

 

It was a very specific operation, Oomila realized that she was only here because she was the only member of the original team that could offer any use to the mission.

 

“Pardon me ‘mam,” Sweetie said, raising a hand, “That’s all very well and good, but you’ve neglected to mention why _I’m_ here. Or my good friend Phaser for that matter.” He gave a friendly smile to the other man who only grunted, “I’m a technician, this kid can suck up any of my bombs and use them for himself.”

 

Something flitted across Matriarch’s features, something that made Oomila very uncomfortable. Very suddenly Oomila knew why Sweetie was here, and her skin went cold despite her layers, and instinctively tucked into a ball. Sweetie seemed to get this impression as well.

 

“See, I’m classified as a technician, its all I’ve had training or field experience with, regardless of whatever _other_ abilities I poses.” His voice was going harder now, though he still tried to maintain his composure. “Surely sending someone out and assuming they can use an ability that has been neither tested in any professional scenario is just as irresponsible as allowing a kid to roam the streets turning cars and bicycles into machine guns.”

 

Maria took a breath, paused, then tried again.

 

“Julian I know you arent comfortable using your-“

 

“Sweetie. Its Sweetie. As in Sweetie- _Pop_ , the ‘Pop’ part pertaining to explosives. I’m a demolition expert, a _scientist,_ I’m not doing any hypnosis _bullshit_ to some thirteen year old kid.”

 

Sweetie seemed to realize that he was yelling and tried to appear laid back again. He failed.

 

Coughing into a fist he turned to Phaser and smiled, “Not that theres anything wrong with _your_ hypnosis bullshit, assuming you can do something else. Which _I_ can, and I will. Somewhere else. I don’t need to be apart of this.”

 

With this he started for the door, but was literally blocked by Matriarch. It might’ve been silly, him being a whole two feet taller then her, if not for the ice that seemed to emanate from him.

 

“Now Ju- _Sweetie,_ ” Matriarch said, her voice becoming so soothing and rich Oomila could almost feel herself falling asleep, “Phaser will of course be doing most of the work in that regard, but as you may know the mind is a volatile place and you are the only other Cerebrokinetc who is currently available.”

 

“I am not a Cerebrokinetc,” Sweetie corrected, “I’m a _technician,_ I can do Cerebrokinety things sometimes if it even _works_ , but on my file it says I’m a technician and can only _legally_ use abilities that have been recorded on my file. I would hate for our fine establishment to get in trouble if I…” He stopped, and it broke Oomila’s heart to see the unadulterated terror on his features which quickly smoothed. “I don’t qualify to be apart of this team.”

 

“If I may,” Phaser spoke up, “Alexander is a child, all minds are delicate but children’s minds especially so. If…” again he trailed off, then nodded in Sweetie’s direction, “…he, has a problem with it, I don’t think he should do it. When delving into someone’s thoughts you need to be sure of what you want to accomplish, doubts and fear can greatly compromise someone’s mental state.”

 

Sweetie pivoted his foot and brought a finger up.

 

“Not sayin’ I’m _afraid,_ ” Sweetie said, “Well, I’m afraid for _him,_ afraid what happens when I get out from between his ears and he thinks he’s a chicken or something.”

 

“I doubt your abilities are potent enough to change someone’s perception of reality,” Phaser added flatly.

 

“Whatever, we agree.” Sweetie said throwing up his hands, “I shouldn’t be here. Phaser can do this himself.”

 

Matriarch sighed and shook her head, before meeting Sweetie’s eyes head on. “Please, I want you to do this.”

 

Again the room went silent. Even knowing everything that happened, how much it _killed_ him he even had such abilities, Oomila wanted to answer for Sweetie that of course he would do it for her. Anything for her.

 

Sweetie took a step back, many emotions crossing his face. Bafflement, despair, consideration, fear, then ultimately anger.

 

“I’ll get on the plane.” He said, “But I’m taking my kit, and the kit’s all I’m using.”

 

Matriarch nodded, and picked up her coat.

 

“Well, I think that we can all work together to help this young man,” she said, her voice light as if nothing had happened, though even her sweetest words wouldn’t make the scene any less awkward, “I think we can save him together.”

 

Piling out of the conference room in silence, it was obvious that her strange behavior had its effect. Even as she felt uncomfortable, Oomila couldn’t help but think that Sweetie was being childish, and how she hated him for making Matriarch so upset. Stubbornly she pushed those thoughts down, stubbornly she told herself that no one was in the wrong here. There was an emergency and Matriarch had done the best she could, and Sweetie had a right to be apprehensive about using abilities he could barely control.

 

The car ride was just as painfully awkward as their meeting had been. Sweetie didn’t seem to mind much, or at least was determined to show he didn’t mind much, and was sprawled out on the car seat with his head back and eyes shut. Oomila debated leaning against him, but was very aware of Phaser watching them both.

 

As much as the UCOI base felt like Oomila’s own special world where no one judged her and she could have everything she wanted, obviously such was not the case. It wasn’t the case for any of them. Be apart of an organization of hundreds of different morally passionate people having to make life or death decisions on a regular bases there were bound to be people who didn’t agree on what calls were made.

 

Oomila had never been a team leader, very rarely had to make and choices beyond which tactics to use to take someone down, but a misplaced double sometimes got her yelled at in the laundry room. She couldn’t imagine what it was like being Sweetie, someone who was a major face in the UCOI and had his name attached to the repercussions of worldwide disasters. The way things were, Oomila could imagine how it was made even worse.

 


	6. Oomi Gets Some Fresh Air

Adolescence was not a fun experience for Oomila. A funny name and speech impediment isolated her in elementary school, a complete lack of social skills and dirty clothes furthered that alienation to harassment in highschool. They hated her not only for the way she looked, but also for the way she’d stare at them, for how she’d show up places uninvited, how her awkwardness was near infectious and prevented anyone from having a good time.

 

It would be easy to say that kids are cruel and the popular girls made Oomila’s life hell for no good reason but that wasn’t the case. It’s rarely ever the case, not _entirely_ anyway. They had all watched underdog movies as a kid, all been taught not to be bullies and ‘The Golden Rule.’ The kids at Oomila’s school were perfectly polite, kind, and intelligent faces of the new generation after all. The problem was that in the movies they hire beautiful, skinny, white kids to play the victims, and big stupid loners to play the bullies. It created an ironic cycle, the abled and beautiful were constantly justified, while the awkward and ugly’s treatment is subconsciously justified.

 

Even those who got wise and called out against her enemies would change their minds at the end of a month. It starts with publicly standing up for the little guy, enjoying the feeling of being a good person more then spending time with Oomila herself. But acting the righteous martyr gets old after a while, especially when you start to think there’s a reason ‘odd but good-hearted little Oomila’ was alone in the first place. Stalking in the hallway, sitting outside dorm room doors when they wouldn’t let her in, constant and desperate looks of approval anytime Oomila said a word. All of this could be forgiven, but Oomila just has to make it… _weird_.

 

That was the fact of the matter. Oomila was weird, and that’s like a virus when you’re young. Constantly reaching to hold hands is weird, parroting opinions blindly is weird, stealing bits of hair is very, very weird, even though that only happened once and it had been an accident.

 

It is weirdness that makes good people cruel. Tells them that it’s alright to revert back to pack mentality and chase away the weak, because she’s just so _weird._ They didn’t want to tell think they were punishing her for existing, but rather for existing in a way they didn’t like. Its because Oomila makes them uncomfortable and can’t get the hint that she’s just not _normal._

 

And in a twisted sort of way, that’s fair. Oomila had to admit that was fair, but a complete lack of human connection and hormones that were going to turn her into an adult whether she wanted to or not were not a good mix. Having sex too early can fuck you up, but having it too late can fuck you up just as bad. It can make you even _weirder,_ if even possible.

 

Highschool was hell. The worst years of Oomila’s life, hands down. She had once been mentally assaulted by an enemy Cerebrokinetc who convinced her there were insects crawling out of her pores and into every orifice, and _still_ in the back of her mind she couldn’t help but think that at least she wasn’t in highschool.

 

So when Oomila thought to herself that the plane ride felt like highschool all over again, it wasn’t a comparison she used lightly. One errant glance from Phaser affirmed that it was no exaggeration.

 

However, this time Oomila wasn’t the recipient of the hostility. This time she was the well-intentioned friend who secretly wished she could make a run for it. Despite everything she knew about Matriach, about Sweetie’s situation, her own experiences in his shoes, Oomila felt their disapproval seeping into her through association. It made her want to leap out the emergency hatch and damn the consequences.

 

Lots of things were going on, even Oomila could tell that much. There was the obvious conflict between Matriarch and Sweetie, some weird thing between Phaser and Sweetie, while Ægis and Lightstreak were just as swayed by Matriarch’s influence as Oomila.

 

On top of all that, they were on their way to fight a _child._

 

Children with superpowers are to be pitied and protected. Regardless of their intentions, the kind of despair required to catalyst is something that scars most _adults_ for life. Even the most harmless powers would be reason enough to need months, maybe _years_ of intensive therapy. There are entire organizations devoted to this, machine and medicinal companies spending millions on trying to ‘cure’ children of their abilities until they are old enough to process the price of them.

 

Everyone here knew the weight of a human life, knew leaving a supervillian alive always had its cost, but there is such an inherent _wrongness_ about having to make that decision about a child. Even as she repeated to herself that the goal _wasn’t_ to kill him, Oomila could only think that if anything _did_ hurt the boy it would be her to blame. No one else here would be on the offensive, if Oomila left one double too long, that’s all it would take _._ She’d have to hear from everyone that she had done the right thing, that it had been an impossible situation, she’d have to somehow justify taking a 13 year old kid’s life to be able to sleep at night.

 

It was horrible, so endlessly horrible, so _needlessly_ horrible.

 

Through the doom and gloom of the cabin, the gentle voices of villager’s nonsense language pricked the back of Oomila’s neck like a spider’s legs. Usually the sounds of Sweetie’s game were relaxing, the music was designed to be. But when the air was so thick from accusations Oomila felt a bit embarrassed for him.

 

When he had first brought it out she had feebly reminded him that he had intentions to sleep, which he shrugged off in favor of chasing virtual butterflies around with a net. Oomila had an opportunity to practice her fish impression as she kept trying to say something to convince him to put it away, afraid he’d snap at her in front of everyone and only further alienate himself.

 

“Why don’t you get some sleep ‘Bay, since you’re so tired?” He finally asked, breaking the silence and making her jump.

 

“I-I…um…hah…” she murmured.

 

No one was looking at her as far as she could tell, but she knew that they could be behind their masks and makeup. Taking a breath she sighed again, realizing that there would be no reasoning with him.

 

“M-maybe I will…yeah…”

 

With that she stood and left the small lounge, sliding open the sole bedroom door to go lay down.

 

Ignoring a forbidden feeling like skipping work during a thunderstorm, Oomila flopped face-first onto the bed. She would have liked to remove her morph hood as to properly breathe, but it was just bad luck to dismantle one’s costume before reaching the destination. Ever since Switcher’s famous battle with the Shadow King, everyone takes that shit seriously these days.

 

But even in her full morph suit, Oomila already felt better. Now she was separated from Matriarch’s influence and everyone underneath it, previously muddy and insecure thoughts could now harden into real opinions and observations.

 

This wasn’t fair on Sweetie, Oomila didn’t need to be away from Matriarch to understand that much. Unlike most of them Sweetie’s catalyst had been loud and had the entire organization as an audience. The effects had been disastrous and broadcasted all over the world, especially after his stunt at the Annual Charity Gala. Not to mention it had all happened _recently,_ recently enough to still spook him.

 

It was the cruel irony of becoming a super hero, sometimes using your awesome powers did nothing but remind you of the horrific ordeal you endured to earn them. On top of that Sweetie hadn’t had the opportunity to even practice using them, and one look at Jæger’s footprints could let you know how that usually turns out. Matriarch had abused her abilities to force Sweetie join this team, made him look like a monster if he were to refuse.

 

But on the other hand, there was the fact that Matriarch was here at all. While arguably one of the most overpowered heroes both on and off the battlefield, Matriarch had a nasty effect on her teammates. Even the most synergized teammates would be reduced to children squabbling to be mummy’s favorite, but her powers went even further then that. When you’re around her it becomes so easy to believe that everything will be all right; that she’s got everything so under control that you needn’t lift a finger to contribute in fear of getting in her way. Often she would be saddled with so much responsibility that everyone around her is made infantile by the assurance that if something is to be done, Matriarch will do it better then any of them ever could. And maybe it was true that Matriarch had things under control most of the time, she was the oldest of any of them, rumored to be the very first to catalyst at all. Even still she wasn’t omnipotent, and when everyone was too busy idolizing her to pick up the slack missions led by her often fell to disaster.

 

The kid must really be causing some damage if Matriarch was taken out of her cushy and mutually harmless therapy gig for a personal evaluation.

 

Oomila jumped as she head the door slide open, and was puzzled to find Phaser. He seemed to blur in the doorway, as if his rout from outside the room to the desk chair hadn’t been recorded in Oomila’s memory. But stranger then the way he seemed to blink through the room, was the way he looked once he came back into focus.

 

Something about him was different, something that Oomila couldn’t quite put her finger on. Had he always looked like this? She couldn’t recall a time where he had changed clothing. Where would he even get a change of clothes? None of them had packed a bag, and why did she feel like she knew him so much more intimately in this moment then she had seeing him before?

 

Her recognition of him felt old and worn, as if they had somehow met years ago. Maybe he was one of the UCOI agents to help with the Hydromancer, but no, that couldn’t be true, Oomila distinctly remembered Valkyrie, Sweetie, and Switcher being the only ones present at the time. Even still, the memory felt even older then that, reminded her of a time when she wouldn’t even have come up to Sweetie’s hip. Surely Phaser wasn’t that old, to be a household name when Oomila was just a child.

 

“I’m sorry to disturb your rest,” Even his voice echoed of familiarity when there had only been aggression before, “I wanted to discuss something with you.”

 

“T-that’s fine,” Oomila found herself saying with more ease then she should have considering he was a near stranger.

 

Phaser straightened, and in a movement that sent a shudder down Oomila’s spine, came to sit beside her on the bed. It was then recognition hit her like a cold slap of water.

 

“D-daddy?” she mumbled, just above a whisper.

 

When had Oomila’s father become a superhero? Joined the UCOI? She had gotten an email about Christmas plans just last month and Mama hadn’t mentioned anything about him leaving. Dad rarely left Boston, a writer’s salary disallowing him to travel much, and when Oomila had gotten her supposed big break as a network assistant in L.A. Mama had told anyone who would listen about her daughter’s achievement. Furthermore, why didn’t Dad recognize her walking about the base? Why didn’t he come to say hello? Was he so offended that she had been lying about the job offer that he didn’t say a word to her? Last time she had visited home he hadn’t acted out of the ordinary at all.

 

Walter Stone seemed just as surprised by her words as she was by his sudden appearance in her life, before his features smoothed once more.

 

“Ah,” He said with a big of a sigh, “I’ve phased.”

 

It was all Oomila could do to blink at him confused.

 

“I-”

 

“I am _not_ your father, Bombay.” He interrupted, the familiar warmth in his voice dropping for a moment, “I can appear as any comforting or trustworthy avatar, usually just that of an unnoteworthy ally.”

 

Comparatively speaking, it was perfectly sound explanation. But it was completely unheard by Oomila as humiliation bit hard down her spine. Daddy, she had called one of her colleagues _Daddy._ Now Oomila was forced to relive _preschool,_ long dead memories rising to haunt her again. The sting was almost physical as she flinched away from him and his confusing appearance.

 

“A-ah…I…” she croaked, unable to stop the strangled noises from escaping her throat.

 

“I’m sorry,” Phaser said, twisting her father’s face into eerily familiar concern, “I must have phased without thinking, what with the tension in the air.”

 

Oomila nodded slowly, unscrambling her nerves enough to consider a polite way to ask him to knock it off.

 

“I’m a bit relieved,” He continued, voice and shape changing instantly to that of before, “For a moment I thought you’d perceive me as…”

 

From the way he glanced at her it seemed he expected her to finish the sentence but in all honesty Oomila didn’t know who he might have expected. She certainly hadn’t expected anyone but Phaser. After an awkward silence he cleared his throat.

 

“Regardless,” he said, “I need to speak with you about the… _problem_ at hand.”

 

“You muh-mean the mission,” Oomila said, “There’s nuh-no problem larger then a kid ripping up civilians ruh-right now.”

 

She tried to keep her tone flat and confident, like Valkyrie whenever some alpha male assumed powerful women all share a secret desire to be belittled. Oomila was pretty sure the stutter ruined it, but she sat up properly anyway.

 

“Yes, to an extent, I do,” Phaser said, “You’re second in command, and while Matriarch is occupied I should direct my concerns with you.”

 

Oomila nodded, hardening herself against his experience and steely demeanor.

 

“I’ve wuh-worked with Swah-Sweetie before…” she said, “Yuh…you have nuh-nothing to worry ab-ab… _about_ regarding him.”

 

Phasers eyes narrowed, the white of the lenses crinkling somewhat.

 

“Yes, that is my issue. He is the least prepared to serve on this team, and both you and Matriarch obviously have a relationship with him outside of our work here. I think it only natural to have concerns with the level of professionalism surrounding such a delicate case.”

 

Oomila bit her lip, her wrist shaking.

 

“He sh…sha-shouldn’t be here…” she agreed, “Buh-but its not luh-like he wants to be.”

 

Without meaning to she tucked her legs to her chest, then sighed and unzipped the back of her morph hood. She pulled it down to her neck and reveled in the cool air. Gazing directly ad Phaser, she continued.

 

“Suh-Sweetie isn’t ah-against us, Phaser. He wuh-wont use his powers, he suh-said so himself. Wuh-worst case he’s juh-juh… _worst case he’s_ just eh-extra baggage.”

 

Extra baggage Oomila would have appreciated. It was so much harder to speak with others without him at her back, knowing that he could pick up the conversation for her, or even finish a sentence if she struggled with it too much. But when Phaser gave that calculating stare, Oomila met it. She was his superior on the team, and even as her insides wriggled he needed to know that her job was more important then any shyness.

 

Whether what he saw in her was satisfaction or disappointment, Phaser’s attention laxed.

 

“Perhaps so,” he said, standing, “I have stated my concerns, and I stand by them. As of now there is no reason to insist, I only ask you try to stay objective.”

 

Oomila had to rehearse her response in her mind to keep her voice from shaking.

 

“We’re _all_  trying to stay objective,” she said, sounding out the words carefully one by one.

 

Phaser examined her again, but she turned her back to him and pulled her hood back over her head.

 

“Wuh-we’re reaching the deh-destination soon. Yuh-“

 

But before she could finish, which was probably not saying much as she might’ve had to retry from the start a few times, a massive shudder went through the cabin, and Oomila found herself knocked from the bed and onto the floor. Even as the jet stabled itself Oomila lay flat on her stomach, prepared for a second tremor.

 

“Projectiles?”

 

Phaser stumbled into the doorway, holding the sliding handle to keep him in place. Just as he opened his mouth to respond the cabin rocked again, this time slamming him back into the hallway wall.

 

Rushing air and freezing wind battered Oomila’s senses, the emergency siren blaring overhead. Phaser was gone from sight in a moment, having either cloaked himself or been sucked into the breach. Oomila remained safe in her cabin, or as safe as she could possibly be. If the slow rising of her stomach to her throat was any indication, they were losing altitude fast.

 

Latching onto the handrails of the hallway, Oomila crawled along a wall that had become the floor, all while wind whipped about her ears and tugged at her clothing. Through the freezing air and the shattered glass Oomila saw the gaping hole where the emergency exit had been, wrenched off and sending them into a tailspin.

 

Only Ægis remained inside, his forcefeild protecting him Matriarch from the door to the pilots cabin. Through the new day’s sunlight reflecting off snowy mountains, Oomila could just make out three dark silhouettes plummeting alongside the aircraft.

 

Gritting her teeth, Oomila launched herself away from the railing and out into the freezing, blinding, dawn. When her flailing hands only passed through wind, she pulled her goggles over her eyes and searched for the first of the dark outlines. Seeing the tuft of Sweetie’s uncombed hair Oomila summoned a double to launch her up to where he fell.

 

Sweetie latched onto her outstretched hand, the other comically holding his heart-shaped glasses in place. For all they were currently plummeting to their deaths, he seemed rather at home with the recent turn of events.

 

But Oomila didn’t have time to appreciate his classical comedic stylings, another double materialized just below her to swing Lightstreak up to their cluster. After commanding the double to plummet and detonate at a safe distance, Oomila looked back to the aircraft. It was still close enough that a harmless detonation could knock them back into the cabin and the emergency parachutes. She'd have to find Phaser quickly, this was as good a window as she was bound to get. 

 

Cold air and the multicolored sky stung Oomila’s eyes as she scanned the skyline. They were running out of time, and there was no guarantee Phaser was even out here. Just as she considered blasting her way back to the aircraft the sky darkened and the wind all but stopped.

 

Oomila felt as thought she was floating, an observer in a sea of phantoms with no body to anchor her sense of self. Ahead, just below where the sun had pricked her eyes, Oomila could see a writhing mass twisting in and out of strange forms.  


Phaser’s shape was impossible, a penrose illustration that shifted into a new avatar before the old could even be comprehended. The effect made Oomila ill, bile rising to a throat she possessed in far away world she could no longer remember. All that mattered was the creature, its writhing and screaming in terror sucking all of her consciousness into its horrific display.

 

Fear radiated through the dark emptiness, nothing but hopeless acceptance for a life cut short- painfully short, _wrongfully_ short. It wasn’t supposed to end like this, she still had so much more to do. There were promises she had never kept, wounds she would let fester. Nothing would save them, they would all die confused and shattered and blinded, as if everything up until this point had been completely meaningless.

 

It wasn’t fair, it wasn’t right, all of this, it was all just so _wrong!_

 

“And he calls _me_ an amateur!”

 

Sweetie’s voice cut through the illusion, followed by the icy sting of the morning sky. Oomila was falling hand-in-hand with Sweetie, her goggles flailing about her neck and occasionally batting her chin. Lightstreak gripped her other arm as he too seemed to come back to reality. Her hoodie had been snatched from her body, now wrapped around what must have been Phaser tucked under Sweetie’s free arm. The aircraft was nowhere to be seen, only a smoking trail that stained a pathway to the earth.

 

“Ægis and Maria went down!” Sweetie called above the wind, “They might still be alive, but now would be a good time for some heroics!”

 

In a perfect world Oomila would have liked to take that moment to vomit up her breakfast, but this was not a perfect world. This was a world where Oomila and the team she was responsible for would soon be unsightly splotches in the Canadian wilderness.

 

Not even wasting the time to acknowledge him, Oomila spawned a cluster of doubles that linked together into a body platform. Having so many out for so long bit hard into Oomila’s chest, more discomfort then even the plane ride had been, but she imagined smacking the tress at their current speed would be worse. She summoned three fresh doubles and detonated them instantly, a small blast that briefly slowed their fall.

 

A double’s elbow smacked Oomila’s rib, and she accidentally detonated a double closer to the middle. The resulting blast scattered her doubles, a few more of them detonating and sending Oomila and her team flying.

 

“How the _hell_ would that have worked?” Screamed Lightstreak, a chunk of his costume singed from the blasts.

 

Oomila ignored him, the ground was coming up fast. Feebly she tried again, trying to break their fall with more harmless detonations. The ground was too close, and even as she managed to slow the decent it wouldn’t be nearly enough. Without thinking she spawned a double near her chest and waited as long as she dared, then eight more to hook arms and legs into a skydivers formation. Holding her breath against the sudden pain, Oomila kicked away from her oldest double and dragged the others up with just enough force to buffet their fall.

 

They landed hard, Oomila was unable to tell if the numbing crunch she felt was the ice or her bones. The remaining doubles popped out of existence the moment they hit the ground, leaving only a brief flash of heat behind.

 

In the fizzling crater, Oomila heard the groans of her companions, bruised and buffeted, but _alive._

 

Siting up Oomila winced, sure that she had least damaged a rib, and looked around. They had blasted a clearing just near the edge of the treeline, having barely missed the enormous icy lake a mile or two away. Oomila tested her limbs and found none broken, then flopped onto her back in exhaustion.

 

Only after her racing heart had calmed was she able to properly feel the cold, or take note of Sweetie’s face near hers.

 

“Hell, Oomi,” he said, a grin that did not match their situation, “Did you just do the _Iron Man_ thing?”


End file.
